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AGAIN IN HAWAII ry«^ Published) 

Being - articles written from Honolulu to the "Evening- 
Post " [N.Y.] as special correspondent May 1S95 with 
introductory essay 60 pages Svo cloth price $1.50 

MEMORIES OF HAWAII 

[1894] Articles written from Honolulu to the " Evening 
Transcript" [Boston] as special correspondent January 
to April 1S94 138 pages Svo cloth price $2.00 

ABOUT MUSHROOMS 

Contributions popular and scientific, to the press, revised 
and illustrated 13 plates 100 pages 8vo cloth 

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Esculent and poisonous, 12 colored lithographs, with 
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A romance of social life on shipboard 365 pages urao 
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Again in Hawaii 



BV 



V 



JULIUS Af PALMER Jr. 



SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT OK THE "EVENING POST" OF NEW YORK 



February-May 1895 




ZZtt/ &4l> 



BOSTON 
LEE AND SHEPARD PUBLISHERS 

1895 



_ 






PRESS OT 



Copyright, 1S95 
by Julius A. Palmer, Jr. 



All rights reserved 



•Kotfctoell antr Cfrnrtbtll 
BOSTON, U.S.A. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



The Exiles from Hawaii, March 4 .... 1 

Hawaiian Law ......... 3 

A Republic under Dictatorial Rule, March 20 . . . 6 

Demands of the Annexationists, March 29 ... . 8 

No Republic in Hawaii ........ 10 

Hawaiian Problems . . . . . . . . 15 

Hawaiian Discontent . . . . . . . . 19 

Minister Thurston's Return, April 4 ..... 23 

The Hawaiian Oligarchy, April 13 . . . . 25 

The Hawaiian Government ....... 27 

Events after Mr. Thurston's Return, April 18 . . . 30 

Chinese Immigration and General Amnesty, April 28 . . 32 

A Miscarried Letter, May 2 ...... 34 

Rule of the Council and its Effect, May 8 ... 36 

Pearl Harbor 39 

[N.B. The dated articles were telegraphed via San Francisco.] 



INTRODUCTION 



By the liberality and courtesy of the proprietors of the New York 
Evening Post, there may be found in these pages a record of the expe- 
rience gained on my third visit to Hawaii. My notes on the first occa- 
sion were published by the Boston Commercial Bulletin ; in December, 
1893, I was engaged by the Daily Evening Transcript, and in 1895 
was commissioned by the Evening Post. The first-named residence 
in Honolulu was years ago, before the destruction of the native mon- 
archy : the later engagements were for three months each, one-third of 
which time was spent on the route. My work for the Transcript 
(138 pages, 8vo) was published by the same house from which this 
is issued ; it bore no foot-notes, nor was the matter corrected to make 
it conformable to the march of events. Yet there has never been but 
one statement therein impeached with a semblance of success ; this was 
the connection of one of the original annexation commissioners with 
certain investments designed for a benevolent purpose by the Queen. 
Had it not been for positive denial by the person implicated, the matter 
would have been repeated as originally stated by me on the assertion of 
those of whom I inquired during my latest visit. But no witness would 
dare to appear even indirectly in support of any assertion inimical to 
those in power. 

This may serve as an example of the difficulty of separating fact from 
rumor in Hawaii ; yet I have preferred to allow the present series also 
to go to the publishers without alterations. In the Transcript letters, 
the views of all parties to the present contest found expression through 
my articles ; the royalists were satisfied that such investigation had been 
made with sincerity ; wherever matter was reported by me contrary to 
their interests, they forgave that which they considered honest error on 
my part. But the provisionalists? No words can express the bitter- 
ness and animosity of the select, self-chosen few — still in power at 
Honolulu — towards any critic who presumes to speak of them and their 
oligarchy in other than the most flattering terms. This statement is of gen- 
eral application ; to it there are notable exceptions, even in the number of 



VI INTRODUCTION 

the nineteen men who constitute the so-called republic of Hawaii. But 
free speech is obliterated there ; any renegade obtains immediate em- 
ployment as a spy or informer ; any newspaper offensive to the ruling 
ring can by statute law be confiscated ; any alien by entering the corps 
whose bayonets sustain the legislators secured clothes, sustenance, and 
a vote ; an editor entirely unacquainted with the prior condition of the 
nation is imported to manage their most influential journal ; an army 
officer of similar professional antecedents is commissioned to discipline 
the government troops; instead of u Hawaiians for Hawaii," — one of 
the last public utterances of the late Gen. S. C. Armstrong, — it is an 
incontestable fact that ignorance of the past and allegiance to the pres- 
ent, and this only, can build avenues to place and preferment. Truth is 
the element most feared by the provisionalists, and as they are many of 
them able lawyers, they have little difficulty in concealing from the 
world all things save their own side of the case. 

The contrasts between Hawaii in its past and present are painfully 
apparent to any visitor. The native and the missionary were once on 
most fraternal relations ; a daughter of one of the latter told me that 
she always felt honored if any member of the chiefs' families noticed 
her in her girlhood. Until within two years there was never such an 
officer as a detective ; now the city is full of spies and informers. There 
was not the least public admission that there could be war ; now all the 
younger men of the community are fired with ambition to be sharp- 
shooters, the sight of the repeating rifle and the sound of target practice 
are equally common. The military guard of royalty was the merest 
handful of soldiers simply for show on state occasions ; the president 
boasts of quite an army of mercenary troops, besides which there is the 
militia or citizens' guard. Bayonet rule is making of the once amiable 
and kindly Hawaiian a morose, ill-tempered, suppressed, but not subdued, 
captive, hating his oppressor, and charging everything, even to the high 
price of taro, to the usurpers. These have done exactly the thing for 
which they overthrew the Queen ; namely, forced a new constitution on 
the nation, which disfranchises all save their own party. Take this 
very constitution, place it side by side with a copy of that of monarchy : 
the latter is liberty, the one promulgated by the so-called republic is 
privileged despotism. The wildest extravagance of the monarchy did 
not equal its expenditure, which has run in debt nearly one million of 
dollars in the two years of its existence, in spite of the fact that it has 
confiscated the revenue of the crown lands reserved from all time as 
the private purse of the ruling monarch. As an illustration of official 



INTRODUCTION Vll 

misstatements, it is a fact that the Queen received from the taxpayer 
just about what is paid the President ; yet these men tell over and over 
again the falsehood that she was paid eighty thousand dollars where Mr. 
Dole receives twelve thousand dollars ; they never mention that the 
surplus was her private revenue, which they have confiscated. 

Their most consummate success has been for over two years their man- 
agement of all general despatches to the press of America and Great 
Britain. Not a single representative of any impartially organized news 
bureau has furnished intelligence to the columns of our leading journals. 
One association has supplied its subscribers from the statements of an 
ex-clergyman, born at the islands, who has had a miscellaneous expe- 
rience as teacher, land-surveyor, editor, always in the narrow channel 
of one clique. Over his own signature in weekly newspapers, this writer 
has repeated the most absurdly false and scurrilous stories about the 
Queen, and he is also the author of like cruel remarks in regard to the 
humbler native people. The least personal acquaintance with the in- 
dividual — now a man of some seventy years of age — would convince 
any one of his unfitness for the position assumed by him. The other 
organization has been equally unfortunate ; its despatches have been 
furnished by recently arrived adventurers, or those connected with local 
papers pledged to the support of the provisionalists, never by a disin- 
terested person of standing sent from abroad. The evil is greater than 
it may appear at first sight ; all intelligence is virtually prepared by the 
very men who have since the first studiously concealed or perverted the 
truth; having made these two organizations their servants, they then as 
private citizens write the same accounts to their personal correspondents 
in the United States ; these latter proceed to confirm individually that 
which is reported in the columns of the newspapers, and thus the American 
people are and have always been systematically and successfully deceived. 
A special correspondent will meet first with unremitting attention and 
flattery, he will be carefully guarded from any information or influence 
save from provisionalist sources. If this fails to direct his pen, he will 
then be indirectly threatened with imprisonment, fine, or deportation until 
he leaves. 

They announced the dawn of a republic in Hawaii, whereas, as a 
simple fact, there has never been the least change in rule since they, by 
means of a reference, subsequently repudiated, obtained the entire con- 
trol, and unseated their Queen. They magnified an attempt to smuggle 
arms into a revolution, in order to justify their action in putting a city 
in which there was never the least riot or disturbance under martial 



Vlll INTRODUCTION 

law ; the latter measure was desired, that about four hundred non-sympa- 
thizers might be arrested without warrant, about one-half of whom were 
released after nearly two months' imprisonment, without recorded charge 
or attempt at trial. 

They appeal to the American love of unrestricted suffrage by tele- 
graphing far and wide the fact that the new constitution proposed by 
the Queen in 1893 would disfranchise them; in other words, that she 
advocated for Hawaii that which obtains in every other civilized nation, 
namely, the limitation of the ballot to those who did not claim other 
than Hawaiian citizenship. Then, the moment they felt strong enough 
to draw a constitution, they proceeded to disfranchise forever the 
greater portion of the residents, especially the children of the soil. 
They objected to the peculiarity which allowed the throne to name its 
heir in case of failure in the succession, a privilege by which the Prin- 
cess Kaiulani, niece of the deposed Queen, is now the legitimate sover- 
eign. Then, in a convention having not the least popular warrant for 
its existence, they proceeded to name as absolute ruler for six years 
Sanford B. Dole, the same individual who had executed with consum- 
mate ability and commendable conservatism their will for the two pre- 
vious years. They then sent word all over our land that the native 
people were taking the oath of allegiance, holding annexation meetings, 
and repudiating royalty ; in the first place, their records show that about 
half a dozen a week may, from desire to retain situations, swear alle- 
giance to their white masters, that on the island of Oahu one hundred 
and eighty-five came in where the total male population of Hawaiians is 
over six thousand ; second, that none of those now registering can have 
the least exercise of suffrage for nearly three years; third, that if they 
could, the sole treaty-making power in Hawaii is vested in Hon. Sanford 
B. Dole. The whole number of residents in the Hawaiian Islands may 
vote unanimously to-morrow for a treaty by which a return to monarchy 
should be guaranteed under the protectorate of a stronger power, or the 
same universal expression of opinion may declare in favor of annexa- 
tion to the United States of America ; the senate, if it ever convenes, 
may ratify, the presidential cabinet may approve, but no power save 
the fiat of the present absolute ruler, or, in case of his death, the suc- 
ceeding and duly commissioned executive of the dominant party, can 
ever have the power to initiate a treaty. There is probably no more 
perfect system of absolute despotism known to history than that of 
Hawaii since the dethronement of the Queen. 

As there are many persons still ignorant of the history of this victory 



INTRODUCTION IX 

of the strong over the weak, a brief statement of fact may properly 
form an introduction to this work : 

From the year 1820 to the year 1887, the native monarchy was sus- 
tained by the residents of other nationalities ; at the latter date, it was 
practically overthrown by the same influences now in place and power ; 
a constitution granted by the reigning monarch in terror of his life took 
the place of one more favorable to his own people. Kalakaua died in 
1891, and was succeeded by Liliuokalani, his sister, a lady educated as a 
girl side by side with the wife of Hon. Chas. R. Bishop, married to 
Mr. John Dominis in early womanhood, and, except during travels 
abroad, a resident of Honolulu during her whole lifetime. Her husband 
received his education at Chauncy Hall School in Boston, and a notable 
public position held by him was that of governor of the island of Oahu. 
Mr. and Mrs. Dominis lived in domestic harmony until the death of the 
former, which took place before the seizure of the government property 
by foreign residents of American ancestry. The legislative period of 
1893 was marked by several measures initiated by the Queen; those 
offensive to the Americans were especially the opium bill, the lottery 
bill, and the new constitution. The first was an adoption of the British 
statute for the limitation of a trade which cannot be suppressed ; the 
second was the proposed granting of a charter to a foreign company, 
by which the Hawaiian government would receive a large, sum of money 
outright, not by means of the sale of tickets, or by any interest in the 
lottery, but simply for the name and the franchise. This sum was 
much needed for the prosecution of public works, and to ease stringency 
in the local circulation of money ; the measure was therefore advocated in 
signed petitions by the merchants and shop-keepers, and was opposed 
by many members of the churches. The new constitution was an 
abrogation of the privileges wrung from Kalakaua, the most notable of 
these being that peculiarity of Hawaiian law which gives to an alien the 
right to the ballot. Availing themselves of the Queen's attempt at 
arbitrary rule, the American element, in collusion with the naval and 
diplomatic representatives of the United States, seized the reins of 
power, raised the flag of their nativity over the government buildings, 
and declared for annexation to the American Union. This was on 
the 17th of January, 1893. A mission of annexation was hurried to 
Washington, was encouraged by the administration of President Har- 
rison, but totally defeated on the inauguration of President Cleveland, 
for which the American people without distinction of party owe to the 
latter an eternal debt of gratitude. The Queen had submitted without 



X INTRODUCTION 

an attempt at resistance, had ordered the surrender of all arms and 
funds to the insurgents, on the assurance that the case would be heard 
and adjudicated by the United States. In conformity with this under- 
standing, President Cleveland sent Commissioner Blount to Honolulu 
to make an investigation ; after most thorough research this gentleman 
reported that the Queen should be restored to her rights, in accordance 
with which decision the President made a demand on Mr. Dole to 
submit to the result of the arbitration, which was refused by that 
gentleman. The Queen had been asked in private conversation by the 
American minister if general amnesty would follow her restoration, and 
she had stated in reply that she thought the property of the rebels 
should be confiscated and they should be punished ; she was incorrectly 
reported by the stenographer to have used the word " beheaded," 
and at the very first reading of his notes, and to this day, she states that 
no such idea ever entered, her mind ; she does not deny, however, that 
she did wish to make such a threat as would induce these men to leave 
the kingdom, for the simple reason that she believed Hawaii would 
never have peace as long as they were an element in its politics. Both 
the Queen and her people never gave up the'hope and expectation that 
the United States government would redress the wrong committed by 
its agency, nor is that anticipation resigned to this moment ; deep in 
the hearts of the Hawaiian people is the firm faith that the same power 
by whose act their nationality was destroyed will reinstate the native 
monarchy. In the meantime, annexation having become more impossible 
every day, the insurgents were obliged to declare for some settled form 
of government ; they accordingly adopted the word "Republic" as the 
most effective shield to their actions ; they called what they styled a 
constitutional convention of self-nominated, self-chosen delegates. It 
convened in May, 1894, and on the 4th of July, 1894 (so as to insure 
a nominal salute from the guns of the men-of-war), they proclaimed a 
new constitution, naming Sanford B. Dole as President for six years, 
providing for the election of senators and representatives to a legislature 
to be convened in February, 1896, or about eighteen months from the 
date of its election. The registered voters of Hawaii numbered about 
15,000, sixty per cent, of whom were natives. As no one could exercise 
the suffrage under the new constitution save by an oath of allegiance 
to the provisionalists, in other words could only vote for rulers by 
agreeing in advance to vote for those already ruling, the total number 
of registered voters amounted to one-fourth of the former registry ; but 
the proportion is even less than that ; for, during the interim from the 



INTRODUCTION XI 

fall of the Queen to the reorganization of the provisionalists, a large 
number of aliens had been imported by them for their standing army, 
which is composed almost exclusively of men having no interest, his- 
toric or financial, in the welfare of the country ; but by the fact of 
bearing arms for the maintenance of the ruling ring, each of these hire- 
linos was entitled to a vote. The actual number of voters in the whole 
kingdom claiming the United States as their nativity was at the last 
census 637, and of American people of both sexes about 1,900, out of a 
population of 90,000. 

In January, 1895, an attempt was made by those favorable to the 
restoration of the monarchy to smuggle arms, with a view of forcible 
resistance to the men who for over two years had retained the public 
treasury and the means of defence. Not the least representation had 
been given to the other islands during this time, and at this date (June 
1, 1895) Hawaii is still ruled by the very men who unseated the Queen. 
The members of the original committee, augmented from thirteen to 
nineteen, have simply elected a substitute whenever one of their number 
resigned. They learned of the attempted restoration of the Queen 
in season to suppress the outbreak ere organization could make it 
formidable. 

With the view of procuring for her supporters liberty, or at least 
clemency, the Queen at once abdicated, and took the oath of allegiance to 
her captors; but this design was fruitless. They organized what they 
called a military commission, one of the local judges resigning to pre- 
side over its deliberations, and at its close being reappointed to the court 
from which he had resigned. This mongrel mockery of justice and inter- 
national law at once proceeded to dispose of the persons and property of 
all those accused of complicity in the proposed reaction in favor of 
traditional native monarchy, the whole domain being under martial 
law until after its adjudication of about four hundred cases. In the mean- 
time the nineteen, sitting as a legislative body, had passed a large number 
of special statutes calculated to enforce their will against any opposition 
for the future, without the necessity of another declaration of martial law. 

My first letter, written from San Francisco, confuses the un- 
completed legislation of last year with the completed w r ork of the 
present; but the laws against personal liberty are now so much more 
numerous and so much beyond my statement in the matter of stringency 
that I make no change in the paragraph. 

Such is a brief statement of the events of the past two and a half years 
in this uuhappy country, and the natural inquiry here is : 



Xll INTRODUCTION 

"How will it all end?" 

That is the most difficult question which can be asked. The only pre- 
diction in which all agree is that there can be no stability to the present 
rule. How it will be merged into another, and what that other will be, — 
on these points there is no concord. Annexation to the American Uniou 
is farther off tlian ever ; profits are too narrow on sugar for the planters 
themselves to favor the abrogation of contract labor ; they cannot make 
any alliance with Great Britain ; all threats of that are nonsense, used 
simply to terrify the United States into protecting the oligarchy. 
Should they seriously try it, and the court of St. James were willing, — 
both improbabilities, — what would be the result ? In the first place, they 
must give to us one year's notice of the termination of our treaty; 
during that year they would be at the mercy of domestic revolution ; 
then having made their alliance with Britain, their home products become 
dutiable, and this would be the financial ruin of every planter and mer- 
chant in Hawaii. They will use this scourge to bring us into line, but 
we must laugh in their faces and tell them to go there just as quickly as 
they can. Japan is the power most feared by them, and with reason ; if 
her citizens continue to increase, and more especially if they are educated 
to that degree to demand suffrage, which Hawaii wishes to refuse, — the 
home government may enforce their claim. However effected, the acces- 
sion of the Princess Kaiulani is the only avenue to peace ; now that 
Liliuokalani has abdicated, it is the natural and proper solution of the 
difficulty. All that is said of unfavorable comparison between her 
family and that of the Kamehamehas is mere political gossip on the part 
of those who control the local press and foreign despatches ; nothing 
which they say is worthy credence ; it is all manufactured for attaining 
their ends — greed of gain and love of power. In their own histories 
of the great chiefs of Hawaii fifty years ago, the Kalakauas are ranked 
next to the family which was then reigning ; Princess Kaiulani is the 
only representative of the royal blood, and it is just as absurd to say 
that she is not entitled to rule her people as it would have been in 
England to assume that because one royal line had failed, therefore there 
was no legitimate heir to the throne. As it is absolutely impossible to 
breathe a word against her character, her education, or her legitimacy, 
the only political scandal they can circulate is that of the impeachment 
of the right of the whole line. They dread this brave girl, because any 
one of the discordant elements of the community, American league, 
Japanese, native Hawaiians, or foreigners resisting despotic rule, would 
be sure of generous support by raising her standard ; but it is very 



JNTKObUCTiON xl ii 



doubtful whether she would return to the islands unless the call were 
unanimous. 

In any case the policy of strict non-intervention should be followed 
by the United States. The most impudent assumption the world ever has 
seen is that of these men when they try to claim protection of their per- 
sons or property uuder the utterly false allegation that they are Ameri- 
cans ; the} 7 circulate all over our land schedules showing millions of 
"American capital" now invested in the Hawaiian Islands, when as a 
matter of fact there is scarcely one dollar of American capital there. 
In 1876 the islands were practically bankrupt; then the action of the 
Hawaiian government in negotiating the reciprocity treaty, leasing to 
these sugar companies arable lands, importing for the planters coolie 
laborers, and offering them every inducement for the cultivation of the 
sugar-cane, raised them to untold wealth. Most of the money invested 
there was never exported from any part of America ; it was made ex- 
actly the same as it might have been made on the coffee-plantations of 
Brazil or the rice-fields of Japan ; it has paid to us no taxes, and is 
entitled to no protection. This is even less so from the citizenship of 
those who have amassed this property ; for these so-called Americans 
were most of them born on foreign soil ; they were educated under the 
flag which they have seized ; they have sworn allegiance to its deposed 
monarchy ; many of them have held prominent positions in the cabinets 
or councils of its kings and queens. Now that their position, by reason 
of their rebellion, has become somewhat dangerous, for them to call on 
the land of their ancestors to protect them against their surroundings is 
one of the most absurd and unreasonable claims ever advanced in the 
history of the civilized world. 

Did we send naval vessels to Paris at the time of the commune for 
the purpose of protecting our colony at the French capital? 

Yet our citizens there are guiltless of complicity in political move- 
ments, while at Hawaii they have been the initiators of revolution. 

The saddest part of the story to the believer in Christianity is that it 
has utterly annihilated the power for good of the Protestant missions, 
has given them a set-back from which they will never recover. This is 
in no way the fault of the missionaries, who were the most self-denying 
and devoted of men and women, but it is an unanswerable proof of the 
defect of their system. What was this? Its avowed purpose was to 
link colonization and evangelization ; in other words, to disobey inten- 
tionally the ancient dictum, " Ye cannot serve God and Mammon." 
The missionary packet of 1820 was to carry with the gospel the family, 



XIV INTRODUCTION 

business enterprise, and Yankee thrift. For one generation the model 
for native imitation did all that had been claimed for object-teaching by 
good example. But how about the children and grandchildren, the 
nephews and nieces, of those same missionaries? Their descendants 
were no different in principles from ministers' sons and deacons' 
daughters in Massachusetts. There has therefore grown up a generation 
whose avarice, social or political misdeeds are unjustly charged to the 
missionaries. 

The Roman Catholic missions have not suffered, simply because with 
a celibate priesthood and sisterhood alike vowed to poverty, there was 
no temptation to acquire wealth. Further, as in our own Civil War, 
that church has known how to keep out of all political affiliations. 

It is the largest religious body now existiug in Hawaii, and is every 
moment augmenting its strength. It has a bishop and twenty-four 
clergymen, about one hundred churches or chapels, nearty two thousand 
school children at its schools, five hundred boys and four hundred girls 
at two institutions in Honolulu alone, sixteen educational institutions, 
and a total Catholic population by the last official directory published in 
the United States, of 30,000 souls. It encountered a storm of persecu- 
tion ere it secured a foothold there; its missionaries were deported with 
a promptness and persistency, recently exhibited towards those who do 
not sympathize with the political opinions of the dominant party. 

Yet it is too true that no form of Christianity necessarily gains that 
which has been lost by another. Abnegation of all religious belief is 
far more likely to follow ; therefore every lover of the Saviour of man- 
kind should regret the scandal brought on the name of out' common 
Lord by the so-called "missionary-party" of Hawaii. 

But while as a political party or an association the ruling ring at the 
Hawaiian Islands must be unhesitatingly condemned, it is still true that 
as individuals these very men are philanthropic, charitable, hospitable, 
and iu devotion to the religious, benevolent, or educational needs of the 
nation the} 7 can rightly challenge comparison with an} T country in the 
world. From the schools for all nations established on the kinder- 
garten system to Oahu College — this latter one of the most interesting 
institutions I ever visited — their zeal and liberality are shown in more 
ways than there is space in a political pamphlet for me to notice. 

It may be asked why, as patriotic citizens of this great and glorious 
country, should this question be to us of consummate or vital importance. 
Chiefly because the avowed object of these men is to intrude themselves 
into our politics. They have succeeded already in doing this to an 



INTRODUCTION 



XV 



alarming extent, and, although our long-established conservatism has 
been stoutly maintained, yet they have not relaxed their efforts, nor will 
they cease from attempting to involve us in their domestic troubles. 
Leave them to the settlement of their own difficulties. They have dis- 
franchised the aboriginal people, have imprisoned their Queen, have 
confiscated all crown property, so that now the princess is a poor 
Hawaiian maid on English soil, fortunate that she is with those who love 
her for herself alone. 

Such, alas ! is but one chapter in the story of the latest of those of 
the world's history where the weak are dispossessed by the strong; it 
came even to our ancestors with William the Conqueror; it is evident in 
the long century of dishonor of American treatment of the native 
Indian ; it rose towards heaven when the Sepoy was literally fired from 
British guns ; it was the only excuse when poor Pizarro bought an iron 
chain with a prison-cell piled with gold ; it cheered on the hosts of 
Cortes in his march on Mexico ; but it met its defeat, this spirit of 
cheating the original land-owner of his holdings, when a woman, Isa- 
bella, — of pious memory, — said that the foreign race could only remain 
on the soil God gave the Spanish people, by being the servants and not 
the rulers of the people. Had the Hawaiian monarchs taken this posi- 
tion in the day of their grandeur, it would not have been reserved for a 
royal matron and a princely maiden to bear in person the agony of a 
nation's humiliation. 




No. 10 Broad Street, 

Boston, June 14, 1895. 



THE EXILES FROM HAWAII 



Sa.v Francisco, March 4. 

The Honolulu steamer which arrived on Saturday brought nine of 
those persons who preferred exile from Hawaii to the risk of trial by the 
existing court-martial, not a member of which tribunal is of such charac- 
ter or antecedents as would be approved by the men who employ its 
agency. The Dole government have been forced to use men and means 
for the suppression of the recent outbreak, and indeed since they first 
came into power, that personally they could only despise. Two leaders 
go free as a reward for betraying comrades. The light sentence of Lil- 
inokalani — five years' imprisonment and $o,000 fine — is in contrast to 
that of about ten conspirators who receive thirty-five years' imprison- 
ment and $10,000 fine. No one suffers capital punishment. The fines 
can never be paid, and it is quietly said that if all will now combine for 
annexation general amnesty will follow, because the United States will 
have to keep the peace between all parties. 

What to do with the Queen was a puzzle when the steamer left. She 
is now a prisoner of state in comfortable apartments, and by this 
clemency the government hopes to secure native influence for annexa- 
tion. Each of the exiles was obliged to sign a paper declaring that his 
departure was voluntary and at his own expense, but that he could not 
return without permission of the minister of foreign affairs. No copy 
of the agreement could be obtained, not even by the deported. 

Business at the islands is paralyzed. There was never known such 
lack of the needful things of life among the natives. Freedom of 
speech is abolished, and among the steamer's passengers was one lady 
who was glad to escape from the officers who had summoned her into 
their presence for openly expressing sympathy with the fallen Queen. 
There is reason to believe that if the government has not employed 
ph} T sical torture to secure evidence, it has wrung that from one prisoner 
which would incriminate others, by the hardest treatment and by threats. 



2 AGAIN m HAWAII 

1 "Mr. Peter C. Jones," so sa} T s an official despatch, " has applied to 
the American minister for a blank for his income return." What a 
patriotic sound that has ! Mr. Lodge should at once move in the Senate 
that the President be requested to appoint a special deputy-collector for 
Hawaii with functions adapted to the laudable desires of the planters 
that they may be allowed to help bear the expenses of our national 
government. 

But prick the bubble and what does it contain? Mr. Jones went to 
Honolulu as a boy, and obtained employment iu the house of Charles 
Brewer & Co. He is now the president of that corporation; all his 
rnoney, — and he is rich, — all the capital of that company, has been 
wrung from Hawaiian soil uuder favoring laws made by Hawaiian 
monarchies. Immense tracts of territory, on which I have seen the 
upland plover as tame as the city pigeons, are practically locked up in 
his vaults. He is the manager of the only safe- deposit and trust com- 
pan}^ on the islands. In person he is one of the genial, agreeable, 
religious gentlemen who make visitors so welcome, and of whose hospi- 
tality one cannot too highly speak. But in politics his experience has 
been quite versatile, for he was a prominent member of the last official 
cabinet of " a barbarian, bloodthirsty queen." He was also one of the 
first to conspire for her overthrow, and a prominent official of that early 
organization called the provisional government. Now, having taken a 
solemn oath to serve two masters, he is not quite sure that either will be 
able to protect him in life and property, so he offers the American 
republic two per cent, of his income as an insurance premium. AVill 
Mr. AYillis or Mr. Gresham take the risk? It is to be trusted that these 
gentlemen will refer Mr. Jones to the innumerable forms of insurance 
now in vogue ; surely there must be some enterprising agency in New 
York, life, fire, explosion, or casualty, which will take Mr. Jones's two 
per cent., spare us an international complication, and at the same time 
make a Hawaiian citizen of forty years' honorable record under that flag 
perfectly safe and happy in his island home. If the people only kuew 
how these general despatches are manufactured by the petty minority in 
power, they would have little faith in the attempt to use them to the 
discredit of the Washington administration or to the advantage of the 
autocratic sugar-planters. 

1 From the " Post" of March 1, 1895. 



HAWAIIAN LAW 



HAWAIIAN LA"W 



I saw yesterday a copy of the proclamation of the President of Hawaii 
suspending the writ of habeas corpus. So far as this is in keeping with 
the persistent efforts of the ruling ring to pose for effect before the 
nations, it was a proper move. But there was not the least necessity 
for such action. This writ, the right of free speech, the privilege of 
being assumed innocent until proven guilty, the power to land in Hawaii, 
the right to reside there, were all abrogated by statute law about a year 
ago, and a special proviso made that if any constitutional obstacle were 
in the way of the execution of such statutes, the latter should take pre- 
cedence of the constitution. The new constitution confirmed all acts of 
the provisionalists, so one may not land at Honolulu unless he can give 
a satisfactory reason for coming to Hawaii; after landing he maybe 
arrested without other charge than suspicion of sedition ; he may not be 
admitted to bail ; he must prove that he is not guilty of any accusation ; 
he may be deported, and, if he returns put at hard labor without further 
trial. No allusion to these laws has ever been made in the general news 
furnished to the world from the locality where they originated. 

It is assumed that those who have just arrived here as exiles were 
expatriated as a war measure ; in reality the Dole government has 
simply executed its own statute law. Hawaii is about the only nation 
on the globe which has always maintained a rigid passport system. 
This applies to alien and native alike, and is no different to-day from 
what it was thirty years ago. No one can leave the islands without a 
government passport, and any creditor can thus maintain his hold upon 
a debtor. Among the deported and the exiled who have just arrived on 
the Pacific slope were quite a number by no means clear of debts ; as 
the ruling ring furnished them with passports contrary to the usage of a 
half-century or so, their creditors now hold that the treasury must pay 
these debts, and, what is more, the claimants are sustained by the legal 
advisers of the government. Thus a creditor can now, by procuring 
the exile of an undesirable debtor, collect the full amount of a worth- 
less debt, or the debtor, by magnanimously favoring royalisin, can 



4 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

secure a free passage abroad and leave no pecuniary obligation undis- 
charged. 

The court-martial has been extremely lenient in its treatment of the 
poorer class of natives; twenty-one were declared u not guilty " on a 
single judgment, and told to go and sin no more. The condition of 
these once happy people is pitiable. The few things needful to sustain 
Hawaiian life were never so difficult to obtain. They are told that the 
proper remedy for their poverty is annexation to the United States. Ju 
a sense this is true. Had it not been for the courage of President 
Cleveland in promptly sending back the treaty designed by the preceding 
administration, the recent session of Congress might have accomplished 
even less of national importance than it did, because the great need of 
Hawaii is that foreign money^ shall be circulated there, and a well-salaried 
board of commissioners, composed of the sous of the missionaries, 
would have been by the present time paying out greenbacks for the 
support of some thirty thousand of the nation's new, deserving, and 
suffering wards. How the Republican party will enjoy, when in power, 
adding to the Indian appropriation and the pension list the amounts 
needed for the amelioration of the condition of the Hawaiian race, in- 
cluding a liberal provision for the leper's island ! How patient our 
nation must learn to be, when financial or interstate questions seem to 
us all-important, that our domestic affairs must be laid on the table 
in order to give Senator Lodge time to outline his plans for the 
proper government of our new colonies, these islands exactly the same 
distance in time from our shores as Queenstown is from the city of New 
York. 

The Dole government acted with commendable promptness in the 
recent seizure of arms, before those for whom they were imported had 
time to organize. No one regrets the clash more than the most ardent 
ro3 7 alist. The reason of this is that the outbreak has united the factions 
of the dominant party at Honolulu. Some of the sugar-planters had 
given in their" allegiance to the principles of Claus Spreckels. This 
gentleman has been from the first an open opponent of annexation ; 
he simply says that its success means the abrogation of the contract 
system ; that sugar* cannot be raised at a profit under any other system 
of labor, if for no other reason, because at a critical moment the labor- 
ers would name a price which would have to be instantly accepted or 
the year's crop of sugar would be lost. Now, with that love of personal 
power which grows with its use, and with the fires of patriotism cooled 
by their experience with the Washington government, some of the sugar- 



HAWAIIAN LAW 

barons begin to think that Mr. Spreckels is right, and these have been 
called false to " our flag," which latter emblem does not mean at Hono- 
lulu the ensign under which they were born and amassed their wealth, 
but rather the colors borne by the missionary packet which entered the 
port of the Kamehamehas fifty or more years ago. 

Persons of Hawaiian affiliations who dwell at San Francisco freely 
confess now what they were reluctant to avow a year ago, namely, that 
local government is an impossibility in Hawaii, that the republic so 
culled will never elect a president ; the term of the present proclaimed 
official will be the limit of the new constitution. " What then will be the 
end ? " I ask it, not as an interviewer, but in social conversation with 
men who have held the highest of State or national offices. There is no 
unanimity in the replies; there was once the single word annexation. 
But now the solution is a United States protectorate, with Pearl Harbor 
strongly fortified and securely held, a joint protectorate of the older 
nations, union of the islands with Great Britain, voluntary on their part 
for self-protection, or lastly their surrender by force to Japan. A 
resolution favoring annexation to the American Union has just been 
defeated in the Senate of California. 

Although the Dole government claims to have proven its inherent 
strength, yet it is still at a loss to know just what to do with the Queen. 
Nor is this perplexity confined to the royal prisoner alone. The follow- 
ing extract from a late editorial in the official organ shows how glad 
they would be to shift this responsibilit}^ on to the United States: " If 
Secretary Gresham will only raise ' Old Glory ' over the executive build- 
ing, and station a marine with a rusty musket to protect it, the country 
would be safe in letting every prisoner go scot-free ; otherwise it will 
have to keep up the work of rigid prosecution until some future day 
when the pendulum of friendship swings this way." 

To annex countries distant from our shores, where all is peace and 
the desire for union is unanimous, is contrary to the policy of the 
United States ; what shall we say then to the proposition to grant the 
American flag to a nation where all is discord and chaos, simply because 
the only way a general amnesty can be declared is under the guns of 
our navy? 

Mr. Boutelle's table of Honolulu commerce has reached this coast, 
and his statistics greatly flatter local pride. There is in truth one new 
avenue of American commerce recently opened. Three ships will carry 
sugar cargoes from Hawaii around Cape Horn to New York ; but, alas ! 
one of them is under British colors. 



AGAIN IN HAWAII 



A KEPUBLIC U^DER DICTATORIAL RULE 



Honolulu, March 20. 

No republic whatever exists in Hawaii. The islands are still ruled 
by the persons self-chosen at the time of the dethronement of the Queen 
two years ago. Vacancies in the original nineteen are filled by elections 
in which associates are tlie only voters. All statutes are designed and 
enacted by the provisional government, sitting as they always have in 
councils. Laws are promulgated by advertisement in the daily papers 
over the signature of President Dole, The rulers are from Honolulu, 
no other place having the least representation. The legislature, elected 
by the suffrages of four per cent, of the population, has never been con- 
vened, although the election was held three months prior to the recent 
disturbances. 

The nature and extent of that revolt were immensely exaggerated. 
It was a mere riot, only three persons in all being killed, and those by 
their own imprudence. Two months of the strictest martial law enabled 
the government to confine during that time about four hundred persons 
not in sympathy with the rulers. About one-half of these cases were 
adjudicated by court-martial, thirty persons were forced to leave Hawaii, 
three native newspapers were suppressed, and all connected with the 
opposition journal, the most outspoken, now are in prison ; its plant 
is distrained for rent, and is advertised for auction sale. Statutes 
restraining personal liberty and abolishing in some cases trial by jury 
have been freely passed during the closing week of martial law. The 
President personally introduced and advocated laws for the suspension 
for four years of any seditious newspaper, and also for the arrest, im- 
prisonment, or banishment of any person having intentions hostile to 
the government. All that was done under military rule is confirmed, 
and no suit for damages can be brought '"for things done, omitted to 
be done, or which shall be done in the exercise of the recent power or 
authority," the exact language of the acts of oblivion and indemnity, so- 
called. 

Certain aliens advocate the establishment here by the great powers of 



A REPUBLIC UNDER DICTATORIAL RULE 7 

consular courts, such as exist in countries where legal punishment for 
offences would essentially differ from the penalties imposed by civilized 
nations, where a jury trial is not possible. 

A British war-ship has arrived and a German one is said to be on the 
way here. 

The government is very careful not to offend Japan. Nearly one 
thousand Japanese have just arrived. They have increased here fifty per 
cent, in two years, and now compose more than one-third of the male 
population, or about twenty-five thousand. Most of them have received 
militia instruction. All are united and intensely patriotic. Three Japan- 
ese newspapers are published in Honolulu. The authorities summoned 
one editor, and charged him with giving an affront to the government in 
criticising the manner of procuring and using State's evidence. He main- 
tained his ground, and was liberated without a formal arrest. Such has 
been the treatment of all natives of Japan throughout the months just 
passed The poorest laborer of that nationality is safer than any other 
alien who does not openly sustain the government. 

It is strongly advocated that the laws against seditious language be 
applied to correspondents, and that these be punished in Hawaii for 
that which is printed in America. 

President Dole is far less conservative than formerly. Contrariwise, 
he introduces and advocates in councils the most stringent measures. 

The financial report show T s a public debt of nearly 14,000,000, a 
nominal balance in the treasury of $300,000. But it is said that the 
largest part of the available funds are deposits of planters and bankers 
for which certificates are issued, redeemable in silver at the pleasure of 
the holder, so that balance is an augmentation of the indebtedness. 
The recent troubles cost about $100,000 in pay and sustenance of those 
who demanded guard duty for the greatly needed support of their 
families. 



8 AGAIN IN HAWAII 



DEMANDS OF THE ANNEXATIONISTS 



Honolulu, March 29. 

Unbroken quiet still reigns in Honolulu. Local business is improved 
by the disbursement of the pay of the home guards. The ruling powers 
are relaxing somewhat from their recent severity. Those connected 
with the suppressed newspapers have been released under detective 
surveillance. 

An annexation meeting has just been held by the league, contrary to 
the desire of the ruling ring. The speakers openly advocated the over- 
throw of the men in power, charged them in plain words with being 
upheld by bayonets, declared they had impoverished the natives, pro- 
tested against the recent restrictive statutes, and stated that Hawaii, 
having tried foreign intervention and civil war all in vain, must now rid 
herself of the yoke by annexation. These are the opinions of promi- 
nent half -whites, but the great mass of the natives stayed away, still 
hoping that Hawaiian nationality will be restored by the power which 
extinguished it. 

From widely diverse points of view, representative men of all parties 
say that the present government cannot maintain itself another year, that 
no republic is possible, and that bayonet rule against the consent of the 
governed must fail, besides which there are serious financial problems 
unsolved. The absence of Minister Damon may portend a foreign loan. 

The Queen is still treated well, but as a prisoner. She is in the execu- 
tive building, is allowed attendance and private meals, and after five 
o'clock she can walk on the balcony. The government press gives 
currency to the rumor that she will be released. Her friends believe she 
has refused a proffered pardon unless the amnesty is made far more 
general. 

There is much unfavorable comment on the death of Ex-Attorney- 
General Petersen, caused by two months' imprisonment without trial, 
and exile to a cold climate, although he, in common with half those 
arrested, took no part in the revolt. 

The most exciting event has just occurred in the deportation to another 



DEMANDS OF THE ANNEXATIONISTS 9 

and distant island of thirty-four natives. They were educated, intelli- 
gent men, but were sent to labor with criminals on the roads, because 
sympathy was daily being proffered them in Honolulu. More than two 
thousand persons witnessed the transportation, which was closely watched 
D y government sharpshooters in citizens' dress. Marshal Hitchcock went 
with them. When the steamer started, all the natives raised their voices 
in wild, wailing death-songs, such as have never been heard except in 
ancient days or at the burial of a chieftain. The prisoners sang Hawaiian 
hymns until out of hearing. 

The restored writ of habeas corpus was first used by Japanese passen- 
gers desiring to land with that amount required in bank drafts, not coin. 
The decision was adverse to the Japanese, but the consul demanded the 
immediate collection of each draft ; returning the amount to each pas- 
senger who then landed, the government yielding, as always, to the only 
foreign power it fears. 

A general report is current that the legislature will convene in May. 
It must be a special session called by the President. He will do this or 
continue the present despotism according to the dictation, at that time, of 
the sugar-planters of whose organization he is simply the mouth-piece. 

A new daily paper will be started immediately on the plant of the for- 
mer native organ, and under the same editor. It will bitterly oppose 
missionary rule and the present government, and will advocate general 
appeal to the suffrage for the overthrow of the oligarchy. It will call 
on the United States to deliver the Hawaiian people from the present 
rulers, either by annexation or a strong protectorate, because by inter- 
nal treachery and external support, America has betrayed Hawaii to her 
oppressors. 



10 AGAIN IN HAWAII 



NO REPUBLIC IN HAWAII 



Martial law was declared in Hawaii on January .7th. Passes were 
required of all citizens found on the streets after half-past nine iu 
the evening, liquor saloons were closed, all persons were required to 
deposit all their arms with the government, the courts were suspended 
save for civil business, the nineteen rulers gave up their assembly room 
for the sitting of a court-martial, and the prison was crowded with 
men of all nationalities arrested without warrant, and detained with- 
out specific charge or prospect of trial. On March 4th the bars were 
opened, on the 5th the arms were returned, and by the 18th all cases, 
one hundred and ninety' in number, had been tried by the court-martial 
(adjourned sine die) and martial law was raised. 

There was but one excuse for the existence of these two months of 
absolute suspension of personal liberty. It is this : Whatever is pub- 
lished to the world, Hawaii is not and never has been even the sem- 
blance of a republic ; it is exactly the same military despotism which it 
was the week after the Queen's dethronement ; only this and nothing 
more. The riot at Waikiki, occasioned by the desire of the native party 
to import arms, all those formerly owned by them having been surren- 
dered in January, 1893, was most eagerly embraced by the ruling ring as 
the opportunity for which they had long waited to give their opponents 
a renewal of an ancient precedent known in France at the close of the 
last century. 

On July 4, 1894, taking advantage of the fact that public salutes 
would be given to the dawn of America's Independence D.ay, with that 
pretension which has characterized every public act of this oligarch} 7 , 
they announced to the world the evolution of the Hawaiian republic, 
terrorizing the natives by the guns of the men-of-war saluting in Hono- 
lulu harbor, appealing to the sympathies of the civilized world by send- 
ing broadcast copies of a document called the Constitution of the 
Republic of Hawaii. They went through the farce of an election, and 



NO REPUBLIC IN HAWAII 11 

sent abroad a list of nominally chosen legislators. Note well, this was 
nearly one year ago, when the Queen was urging her partisans to abide 
by the decision of the United States, in whose mediatory offices she had 
never for a moment lost her faith. 

Having done this, the self-chosen nineteen arranged their comfortable 
chairs around the deliberative halls, and sat there, drawing fat salaries, 
making restrictive laws, commissioning foreigners as consuls of the 
republic, importing munitions of war, besides spending leisure moments 
in figuring up the probable profits on sugar, or the effect of a private 
letter to an Eastern friend on such topics as would help their allies 
in our national Congress. Every statute is still designed, debated, 
passed, or rejected by the original provisional government which 
wheedled the the Gatling guns from the Queen. This has never been 
otherwise. 

Do they publish this to the world ? Oh, no, nor did they ever tell 
the story of the brave man, namely, Marshall Chas. B. Wilson, who 
held possession of the royal arsenal two years ago while they were 
quaking in a committee-room ; who refused for twenty-four hours to 
entertain any proposition from them ; who finally said that only on the 
autograph order of his Sovereign w^ould he surrender as much as a 
cutlass ; or that they then commissioned one of their own number to 
obtain this precious bit of writing, afterwards repudiating their contract 
of reference to the arbitration of the United States. 

But it is useless to w r rite of the past ; there is enough in the present. 
The royalist rising has been greatly exaggerated. It was in truth but 
a riot, occasioned by the wish of one party here to arm their adherents, 
with a view of final appeal to the court of last resort, namely, war. 
United States Minister Willis has earned the heartfelt gratitude of the 
suspects. On one day these were not given their usual turn in the jail- 
yard, being kept securely locked in their cells. They were informed 
that a vigilance committee was on the way out to shoot all, without even 
the pretence of trial. To this day it is asserted that only the great 
activity of Mr. Willis and the fortunate arrival of the "Philadelphia" 
prevented this general slaughter. 

Besides enabling the rulers to handle their opponents by a court- 
martial composed of irresponsible persons, no one of whom would be 
invited by any of them as a guest into their families, a number of offices 
were created, about $100,000 put into circulation for the pay of citizens' 
guard, and a newspaper always distasteful to their party was suppressed. 
This was the native organ, and was published daily in both languages. 



12 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

There are in Honolulu three Japanese and two Chinese papers, weekly 
or semi-weekly. On the 16th the editor of one of the former was sum- 
moned by the attorney-general, his offence being stated as "giving 
affront to the government." He is one of its adherents and an employee 
at the Custom House. But he is brave and outspoken — a characteristic 
of all the subjects of Japan in Hawaii. He criticised the course of the 
government as to the court-martial, especially as to its methods of secur- 
ing evidence, its release of the greatest criminals as a reward for their 
treachery to their associates, and used as applicable to the ruling ring a 
word which the official translator told their attorney meant " crime." 
Now to insinuate against these patriots any crime is a felony. Mr. Hosh- 
ina, therefore, is endeavoring to soften the signification of the offensive 
word, and at this writing the patriots and the editor are trying to com- 
promise on u transgression." Doubtless Mr. Hoshina will be dismissed 
with the mildest of reproofs. Why? Because the gunboats of the Japan- 
ese empire are but ten days distant. It was very remarkable that no 
person of that nationality w r as in the least molested in the late unpleas- 
antness ; the reason for this w'ill appear in this correspondence. 

But this case and others like it occasion a clamor for the general 
issue of search warrants into the opinions of government employees. 
This is not rumor : it has already taken the form of petitions to the 
government, and the leading editorial in the provision alist newspaper 
advises the petitioners to make their demands more emphatic. The 
necessity for this inquisitorial process is conceded ; the only question is 
how to apply it. The mildest and most reasonable measure seems to be 
the following — there are at least four organizations here the members 
of which voluntarily subscribe to long paragraphs extolling the patriotism 
of those in power, execrating barbarian queens and heathen practices, 
and clinching their denials of all aboriginal rights by demanding annex- 
ation to the United States. Then there is the standing arm}^, composed 
almost exclusively of soldiers of fortune, who have recently arrived and 
care nothing about matters at issue save as these affect their sustenance, 
— a most important point, to be sure, for without government rations they 
w r ould relapse into their normal and needy condition. To these may be 
added the citizens' guard, composed of residents who may be summoned 
on emergency. It is urged that every person be required to join some 
one of these organizations, and that all persons in public employ who 
have not complied with this requisite be summarily discharged. 

The question of the revival of the native or royalist press, after the 
expiration of martial law, is settled by an act introduced by President 



NO REPUBLIC IN HAWAII 13 

Dole himself, which gives to the government the power to suspend any 
offensive newspaper, or any new journal started in place of such news- 
paper, for a period not exceeding four years. Verbal offences may be 
regulated in future by the act against persons suspected of lawless 
intentions, as well as that against sedition. 

Coming now to the attitude of Japan and the position of the Japan- 
ese, I am free to confess that the matter demands more study than as 
yet it has been in my power to devote to it. On the 14th a German 
stetuner landed about eight hundred more Japanese. In two years they 
have increased fifty per cent, on the islands, or say from sixteen thou- 
sand to twenty-four thousand. These figures are moderate. One-third 
of the male population of Hawaii is Japanese. They are not serfs. 
Each man is a patriot. At the opening of the war with China a volun- 
tary contribution was made by her children here to their mother-country. 
Small sums from the laborer in the sugar field, generous subscriptions 
from the merchants, raised this to nearly $100,000. The home govern- 
ment received it with thanks for the intention, but sent word that the 
treasury had ample means for carrying on the present war, and that it 
would be devoted to hospitals. Many, some say all, of these laborers 
have received training in the militia, of their country. They are usually 
accompanied in coming to this country by a class called free steerage 
passengers. This term is applied to those who pay their own pas- 
sage-moneys have $50, and are not under contract. Many of these 
latter are wealthy men, from the student, military, or professional 
classes. They cling closely together ; they resent the least repres- 
sion of personal liberty. The government is fully persuaded that to 
touch the lowliest native of Japan is perilous. Thus is seen the strange 
anomaly in alien residence : Persons claiming American or European 
protection are marched to prison — ' k Nature of offence left blank" is 
the official entry ; but in the recent outbreak by chance there were two 
Japanese iu official clutches. The report spread among their country- 
men like wildfire, and a deputation visited the station-house ; the men 
were freed. At a national anniversary not long since, a party of 
Japanese, marching through the streets, halted in front of the royal 
residence, and gave three cheers for the queen. The provisionalists were 
wild with rage ; they waited on the Japanese minister, but he declined 
to offer the least satisfaction. One in strong sympathy with the Ameri- 
can annexation movement has just remarked to me: "Each native of 
Japan in Hawaii carries a chip on his shoulder, and is daring President 
Dole to knock it off." There is some truth in this assertion. 



14 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

By the constitution a president is to be elected in A.D. 1900, and the 
next legislature in 1897. Whenever a member of the councils has been 
for any cause out of office, his associates or the other eighteen have 
filled the vacancy. This has been the rule since the queen's dethrone- 
ment, and those who claim to predict the future say that it will inevi- 
tably be so until Mr. Dole knocks oft* that chip, and then Hawaii will be 
just as inevitably a part of the Japanese empire, always presuming 
that American annexation has failed. 



HAWAIIAN PROBLEMS 15 



HAWAIIAN" PROBLEMS 



The remarks of a prominent member of Plymouth Church in relation 
to the Hawaiian missionary republic excited both interest and indigna- 
tion here — interest on the part of those who believe that there has been 
since the first a systematic fraud perpetrated on the people of the United 
States, and indignation on the part of those who have the control of the 
local press, the courts, the jails, and at whose dictation every general 
despatch read by the American people has been for over two years pre- 
pared. Those in sympathy with the sentiments of Mr. Shearman declare 
that if during the period last named such a critic as he had been resident 
at Honolulu, so that the world could have been intelligently and cor- 
rectly informed on all matters pertaining to these islands, the attitude 
of the great powers towards Hawaii would be very different from that 
which it has nominally, and as if by sufferance, become. Those who 
repel his statements as libellous confine their remarks chiefly to the 
notice of his errors in facts. Thus, there are not 100,000 Mongolians 
here, but at the most about 40,000 ; an entire island is not devoted to 
the lepers, but only a certain district of Molokai ; while it is true that no 
Protestant minister has ever devoted his life to the sufferers, it is also a 
fact that chaplains of the Congregational Church have been from time to 
time resident at the settlement. These mistakes are noted with the 
greatest eagerness by the advocates of the missionary party. That term 
is a misnomer, because most of the actual ruling: ring have had nothing 
to do with missions or missionaries. Yet it has become historical, 
and in treating of Hawaiian affairs it can scarcely be avoided. After 
restraining curiosity as long as possible the address of Mr. Shearman 
was printed in full by the most prominent provisionalist newspaper in 
Honolulu. 

Of one thing both sides are certain : Had Mr. Shearman been a visitor 
in this city when he uttered those words for publication at Brooklyn, he 
would have been arrested and prosecuted the moment that any copy of 



16 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

his address found its way back to Honolulu. There are two provisions 
of recent Hawaiian law under which such proceedings can be at any 
moment initiated against an alien and a correspondent ; these are the 
articles in the constitution for the punishment of any person who shall 
be guilty of contempt of the legislative body, even although not a member 
of that body, and, second, the statute enacted against the making and 
publishing of libellous or seditious matter. Much discussion has taken 
place among members of the present government as to the feasibility 
and advisability of applying these restrictive measures to an alien visitor. 
There is a most decided determination on the part of those in power to 
repel the least unfair criticism or misrepresentation of their official acts 
or public reputation, and they assume the privilege of defining what may 
constitute such an offence. Those who do not sympathize with such a 
determination ask how it can be reconciled with the claim that the 
government is abundantly able to maintain itself against internal 
dissensions. 

" He proposes to regulate our affairs, does he?" say the indignant 
missionaries' sons. 

" Oh, no," replies one of the opposite party; " neither Mr. Shearman 
nor any person of his way of thinking has the least desire to meddle in 
your domestic affairs. But we do not mean that you shall intrude your- 
selves into ours ; this you announce as your intention, and it is only just 
that the American people should be fully informed as to the character of 
the community which seeks to enter the Union. Has not a parent the most 
indisputable right to the fullest information as to the record or character 
of the man who seeks an alliance with his daughter? " 

It must in truth be said that the annexation sentiment is weakening 
in the homes of the sugar-barons. " Why," said one of them to his 
associate recently, " why advocate annexation, when the consequent 
destruction of the system of contract labor will annihilate all profits 
from the plantations ? " 

" I agree perfectly with you," replied his partner. " I know that 
when we get the United States flag and the bounty on sugar is abolished, 
we shall make no more money ; but I will gladly resign all hope of fut- 
ure accumulation in that case, because I shall be sure to keep what I 
already have." 

The urgency and difficulty of race problems and considerations of 
finances are now under discussion. The honesty and capability of 
Minister Damon are never questioned, but, has he said to his associates 
in the cabinet : " Appropriate what you will, but remember the treasury 



HAWAIIAN PROBLEMS 17 

can pay out no more money for the present " ? Is it then any more than 
a rumor that by means of the deposits of silver, the issue of certifi- 
cates and treasury notes, an occasional purchase of some $20,000 of 
Hawaiian bonds or deposits in the government postal savings bank, the 
opulent citizens have bled for their country's cause to universal faint- 
ness, and consequently that the object of the departure of Minister 
Damon for San Francisco on the 20th was that he might show to the 
world how much better terms than those accepted by President Cleve- 
land could be made with foreign money-lenders? The only reason 
publicly assigned was that of a personal consultation with Mr. Charles 
R. Bishop, for some forty years the leading island banker, but since the 
dethronement of the Queen living generally at San Francisco, and in 
private business a partner of Mr. Damon. 

The contrast between the official treatment accorded to Japan and 
China is strongly marked. Among recent enactments is one making the 
exclusion act aimed at the Chinese far more stringent. As at present 
constructed, it prohibits the entry of any person of that nationality 
without special permit of the Board of Immigration. This is rarely 
given save on declaration of the applicant that he proposes only to be a 
domestic servant or an agricultural laborer; even then $1.50 a month 
must be deducted from his wages for the purpose of paying his way 
back to China ; should he leave the two above-mentioned avenues of 
employment, he maj 7 be at once deported. This severity is meted out 
to the Chinese to satisfy the American League, which is thought by many 
to be'the most formidable enemy with which the government is obliged to 
contend, because it is nominally of its own household, but composed 
of illiterate men without large estates, who magnify the least aid or 
support rendered to their wealthy rulers, demanding an equal division 
of the offices and the spoils. 

The prominent members of this organization begin to suspect the 
sugar-barons of lukewarm adhesion to the cause of annexation, so just 
on the eve of the departure of this mail is held an annexation meeting, 
the speakers being chosen from all classes. Those not in sympathy with 
the league, yet supporting the government, point to the fact that no more 
inopportune moment could have been chosen, for such reports of despot- 
ism, military tribunal, forcible exile, suppression of a free press, and 
statutory restraint of opinion have gone abroad that no civilized people, 
in the ordinary exercise of good judgment, could desire closer union 
with powers responsible for such a government. The adherents of gov- 
ernment say further that the moment is specially ill-chosen, because the 



18 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

Washington Congress, towards which from the first the provision alists 
have looked not in vain for their most valued defender, has now ad- 
journed. But the temptation to pose for effect upon foreign nations by 
sending forth an account of a mass-meeting is not to be resisted ; the 
Democracy say that their lordly rulers have done this from the very first, 
and give as the latest instance the recent abolition of martial law on the 
very day of the departure of the last steamer. 

Some disappointment has been said to exist in government circles 
at the small proportion of volunteers who came forward in the recent 
emergency. The male population of Honolulu, excluding Mongolians, 
is about 10,000 ; the citizens' guard, increased by loyal recruits, turned 
out at the most with 1,200 men. By this it would appear that the 
militia on emergency numbers say one in twelve of the male population, 
but as most of this 1,200 were recent arrivals who needed the wages, or 
those who have little at stake, the number of actual patriots willing to 
risk life for Hawaii is reduced to a minimum. As a consequence, there 
is now undertaken a most searching inquisition into the sentiments of 
those persons employed by the government, but who rendered it no aid 
in its hour of terror. This is called by the official organ of the rulers 
" the black list," and it is probable that all those who believe too much 
or too little in regard to the republic, and so hesitated to rush to its 
defence, will no longer eat at its tables.. 

An election is ordered to fill the seat of Mr. C. L. Carter, killed in 
the recent trouble, and it was probable that another member of the same 
family would be chosen, but he declined to run. A member of the advi- 
sory council being permanently out of the country, it is urged that his 
seat be filled. The first-named polls will be open to those entitled to 
vote under the new constitution. The latter choice, if made, will be by 
the men who in 1892 succeeded royalism. The councils are the govern- 
ing power of the nation. There are those of undoubted loyalty who 
say that the legislature will never be convened. The constitution does 
not indicate any period for it earlier than February, 1896. From those 
who know the minds of the rulers comes to me the same intelligence 
that I gleaned in San Francisco, namely, that it is impossible from 
every point of view for Hawaii to maintain her present status for one 
year to come. By distinct and different chains of reasoning, the 
experience of the past year has caused each thinking man to arrive at 
this conclusion. 



HAWAIIAN DISCONTENT . 19 



HAWAIIAN DISCONTENT 



Each breath of the trade-wind which blows across these beautiful 
islands is charged with rumor. To listen on the street corner, or take 
notes where men do congregate, were one moved by such evidence, is to 
be convinced that the revolution is yet to come. The few natives who 
made the recent riot were only so many schoolboys who shook the tree 
before the pear was ripe. 

More and more leniency is shown to Liliuokalani ; she is now allowed 
to walk through the grounds of what was once Iolani Palace, providing 
her promenades are not taken before four in the afternoon, and are 
limited by a radius terminating at one hundred feet from the open grating 
of the fence. Her friends believe that nothing less than pardon or per- 
mission to return to her private residence has been offered to her, but 
she has not only refused, but has dared her captors to send her to share 
the imprisonment or exile of her adherents, adding that she would will- 
ingly go into durance, or accept general amnesty, whatever might be the 
universal fate. It is not the Queen as a person which constitutes the 
menace to the peace of Hawaii. The case is this : For seventy years 
royalty has been the basis of union to all parties in these islands. It is 
the loss of any point of union which now precipitates anarchy. 

To state briefly the position of each one of the elements governed by 
the nineteen men in power ; — those of the native race have a feudal or 
tribal pride in the consciousness of possessing a chief of their own color ; 
is this not true with other aboriginal peoples? The Arab sheik or Indian 
sachem may be a savage, but could you supplant his authority with that 
of a philanthropist? The Chinese owe their Hawaiian prosperity to the 
monarchy. For the two years just passed, the existing government has 
been forced to curb this prosperity in order to placate a large middle 
class of whose support their oligarchy had dire need. Ignorance exag- 
gerates its own importance, so that now large numbers of men of this 
class, to each of whom the sugar-barons handed a musket during the 



20 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

late disturbance, clamor for their share of the victors' spoils. Each 
man assumes that Mr. Dole would uot be President to-day had it not 
been for his individual aid. The Japanese are sensitive to the least 
offence, and care not how soon a national quarrel is provoked. The 
better class of Europeans are disheartened at the scarcity of money and 
the insecurity of investments, and, whatever may be their politics, these 
make no secret of their hope for the permanent protection of some one 
of the great powers. 

The vexed question of annexation to the American Union presents 
great perplexities. Whether or no the powers that be still wish for this 
as their first choice is now a secret known solely in their conclaves . It 
has been discovered that only the President individually can make a 
treaty to this end ; that not only the people, but even the Senate, should 
it ever convene, have absolutely no voice in the matter, the new con- 
stitution leaving it entirely with the individual who has been the 
supreme power since the fall of the monarchy. This power is exactly 
that against which the American League is opposed, nor do the speakers 
accredited by the latter in the least disguise their intention to rid the 
country of what they style " missionary rule." No visitor would dare 
to use such language in public as was spoken a few clays ago at a mass 
meeting held under the auspices of this organization. There were two 
noted half-whites engaged as speakers, both of whom expressed the 
most open hatred to the present rulers, described the attempts that the 
nation had made to throw them off, and recommended annexation as a 
last and necessary resort. Through circulars distributed by the city 
police, the authorities warned the natives to stay away from the meet- 
ing, and from one motive or the other, fear or loyalty, this command 
was quite generally obe} T ed. 

Insanity is said to have resulted in two instances where men have pre- 
sumed to unravel the government accounts, and from personal experience 
one ma3 T readily believe it. By the latest statement the gross debt is 
$3,635,475.36, having increased in one week $16,850. Deducting from 
the above $711,200.27, this amount being the sum due under the postal 
savings bank act, the national debt has increased from March 31, 1892, 
to the present date, $610,275.09. Under the last statement made by the 
monarchy, the postal savings bank was in a most flourishing condition ; 
its deposits were $949,049.16, this large sum being divided among depos- 
itors of every race and almost entirely of moderate means. From lack 
of confidence or kindred causes, the demands on the government were 
enormous, and amounted to little short of $400,000 in one bien- 



HAWAIIAN DISCONTENT 21 

nial period. How, then, does it happen that the diminution to-day 
(while the drain still goes on) is insignificant? By official statement 
at this time there is but $133,793.99 in cash in its vaults, of which 
$47,331 is awaiting maturity notice of withdrawal. The government 
has borrowed of its supporters large funds for which it has given 
notes signed by the postmaster-general, so that now there is no way of 
distinguishing between creditors and bona fide depositors. What is 
true here is true in other departments. For example, there was due to 
the firm of Spreckels & Co. $95,000, for which his bank made per- 
emptory demand. It was paid, but the treasury did not pay it; it 
secured its friends, and these still hold that identical claim. Such 
transfers seem to be the rule rather than the exception, and it would 
appear that without foreign relief they must continue. For there will 
be no income of moment received until the December taxes are paid. 
The official expenses, including interest, are about $150,000 a month. 
The available cash, excluding special funds and silver certificates, is 
$173,351.43, having decreased $66,000 the past week. There is a 
large bills-payable account which appears nowhere in any public state- 
ment. The charge that silver is sometimes borrowed from the deposits 
is doubtless false. But accounts are probably paid by bonds, there 
being large numbers of these afloat of small denomination. The in- 
quiry naturally arises, if the government is in good credit and can 
readily dispose of its bonds at par, why does it not do so and fill its 
treasury ? The mystery of Hawaiian government bonds is yet an enigma ; 
these appear and disappear in the official papers in a manner unexplain- 
able by the present writer. About $1,000,000 of the bonded debt was 
placed ten years ago in London, and Great Britain is probably a creditor 
to a somewhat larger amount this day. 

This brief review of Hawaiian finances may aid the speculative in 
predicting the attitude of that power in case of further complications at 
Honolulu. The sum of $50,000 was recently raised by a transaction 
which might excite criticism in view of the missionary antecedents of 
the men who did it, and their severity on the British system of opium 
license when the latter was proposed by the Queen. All the opium con- 
fiscated was offered for sale, and the Chinese merchants of Honolulu 
were invited to bid. As no bid of sufficient amount was received, it 
was exported by the government and sold at British Columbia, realizing 
the sum named. Higher education in the islands has hitherto been in 
denominational hands, Catholic, Protestant, and Anglican. Some 
$20,000 for the coming biennial period may be saved by the clause in 
the constitution which forbids such aid in future. 



22 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

One of the schemes on foot to pledge the government to annexation 
and also to plunder the American people is this : There is a railroad 
now built to Pearl Harbor ; it is the only one in Hawaii, is about fifteen 
miles in length, with possible additions of a few miles from time to 
time, as it is to be extended around the island of Oahu back to the 
point of departure. The latest move is to get the Hawaiian government 
to guarantee $2,000,000 of its bonds, on the representation that this 
nation will never have to pay them, that by union with us these obliga- 
tions will go into the national debt of the United States, and that thus 
this advantage will be gained at the expense of the American people. 

How far the rumors of interference by Japan as the tool of Great 
Britain are the result of the return of Minister Thurston can be as well 
established in New York as in Honolulu. It must be remembered that 
British interference or even influence is the whip by which Hawaii pro- 
poses to scourge the United States until the latter promises to accede to 
any demands of the little oligarchy. The strained relations consequent 
on the Thurston incident are thought by many to be a favorable moment 
for an attempt at coquetry with the court of St. James. The fact, 
however, that Great Britain, France, and Japan, since Hawaii advertised 
the republic, have reduced their diplomatic representatives here from the 
rank of minister plenipotentiary to that of commissioner, ranking as 
consul-general, does not look as though much consideration could be 
expected from the great powers. In both government and diplomatic 
circles general ignorance of the causes of the recall of Minister Thurston 
is assumed in communicating alike with friend or foe, but the news 
created the greatest excitement. There are those who believe that the 
select few in power have known all about it for the past month, and that 
this was the cause of the recent enactment and reenactment of rigorous 
laws. To return to martial law would be to risk further rupture of dip- 
lomatic relations, and give the great powers renewed excuse for termi- 
nating the same. But the world may be possibly kept in ignorance of 
the fact that all which has been done by the military in restriction of 
personal liberty can be done at any moment by the government without 
advertising its despotism to its sister nations. 



MINISTER THURSTON'S RETURN 23 



MINISTER THURSTON'S RETURX 



Honolulu, April 4. 

The all-absorbing topic here is the return of Minister Thurston, which 
is expected four days from this date. Those who have known him 
since his boyhood, whatever their politics now, express surprise that he 
has retained his official position so long. Such persons say that he has 
not the delicacy nor the manners of which diplomatists are made. The 
government officially profess to know nothing more than that he is 
assuredly on the way home, but it is more than surmised that the select 
few were warned of the recall about a month ago. The wish was gen- 
eral that it might not be so. Therefore it was kept secret. 

" He will make more trouble at home than abroad," said some. 
" Why can he not have a mission to Timbuctoo?" said another. 

A grand ball and reception were given to Minister Willis on board 
the "Philadelphia." It was set for the very day on which the news 
about Thurston arrived, and those connected with the government who 
attended could be readily identified by their gloomy air and confidential 
conclaves. They are still in a quandary as to what to do with the 
Queen, and are in almost equal perplexity as to the deposed minister. 
Having formal^ abdicated, it is said that Liliuokalani is now entitled to 
the same respect, title, or position as that accorded to other retired mon- 
arehs ; that official rank ceases with office, royal rank with life. The 
republic has acknowledged this precedent in regard to Kapiolaui, the 
Queen dowager. 

The leading editorial in the government organ to-day labors for a 
column to prove that Hawaii is a republic in spite of its despotic laws 
and oligarchical rule, both of which are acknowledged. Two columns 
were recently devoted to citing international precedents for deportation. 

Eugland, France, Japan, and perhaps other powers, have within one 
year reduced their official representatives here from minister to consul- 
general, and the United States has raised the rank of its consul, to act 
in case of the absence of Minister Willis. It is just hinted that this 



24 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

was clone by the Washington administration in order to provide for the 
permanent neglect to appoint any successor in the event of the retire- 
ment of the American minister. Mr. Willis understands the situation, 
and it would be a great mistake to supplant him by any other diplo- 
matist. It would be far better for all interested to follow the example 
of the three above-mentioned powers. 

The next question of interest is the proposed convening of the legis- 
lature in May, complicated anew by the Thurston incident. If not 
called together, the effect on the great powers abroad and the other 
islands here would be disastrous to the nineteen rulers. It will be 
known that the provisionalists are still absolute rulers, and there are 
many domestic affairs relating to other islands on which the actual resi- 
dents are restless. But if convoked, dissensions are sure to multiply, 
for it is openly proposed to repeal all the restrictive laws of the past 
year, and President Dole cannot stand before the Assembly, as he has 
repeatedly done of late, and control legislation by argument and per- 
sonal influence. 

The national debt has been increased $600,000 and the savings-bank 
deposits decreased $400,000 since 1892. The community is in a state 
of tension, and countless rumors are afloat, but with no apprehension 
of an armed outburst for the present. 



THE HAWAIIAN OLIGARCHY 25 



THE HAWAIIAN OLIGARCHY 



Honolulu, April 13. 

The only legislative assembly ever qualified by the present govern- 
ment, namely the very men who two years ago seized power and pro- 
claimed themselves rulers, has just decreed the pardon of Ashford, a 
distinguished royalist. It was with difficulty that he was convicted, and 
the release was conditional on perpetual exile. The motive was to avoid 
odium like that consequent on the death of Ex- Attorney General Peter- 
sen, for Mr. Ashford is dying. 

The results of the inquisition into the sentiments of all government 
employees have been reported to the council, and sweeping discharges 
are to be made. 

There is not an atom of truth in Mr. Thurston's assertion that the 
natives are taking the oath of allegiance. By the official records five or 
six a week may do this. They do so from interested motives. Five 
thousand or six thousand on this island alone must come in. On Hawaii, 
largest island, Marshal Hitchcock is unable to convince the natives 
that the Queen has abdicated. Her act made no difference in the native 
loyalty to the monarchy in Honolulu. She was deceived by the same 
tactics as those employed at her dethronement. Her sole purpose was 
to save others from punishment. She was absolutely indifferent to her 
own fate, and, greatty to the disgust of her captors, continues so. 

For the first time in the island's history, a subscription relief is 
asked, this being for families of political sufferers among the natives. 
No almshouse ever existed here, and the government has granted an 
unused shed for shelter. Sympathy for those in convict dress is for- 
bidden. These work on the roads, and women are reprimanded for 
recognizing them, even the Queen being told not to sit at her window 
as they pass by. 

Excessive timidity characterizes every public act of the government, 
and race questions are giving the nineteen rulers and the two per cent, 
of so-called Americans, who support them, much trouble. Twenty-four 



26 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

hundred aliens have arrived in three weeks, divided among Japan, the 
Azores, and China. A general registry of all persons and a stay of 
foreign immigration is advocated. 

Even the better class of European residents are much offended 
because an official tax-list has just been advertised in a Chinese news- 
paper to save a trifling expense. To placate critics, the government 
has dissolved the Chinese fire company and has thus aroused the enmity 
of the merchants of that race, as it was one of the most efficient for 
their protection. 

The citizens' guard has refused to recognize the clause imposed by 
the rulers, that the volunteers shall submit to martial law in the case of 
charges against a member. The government was forced openly and 
fully to recede from this, so that discharge from service constitutes the 
sole discipline. 

Mr. Thurston arrived to-day. Never was a person more unwelcome 
politically. There is literally none so poor as to do him reverence. 
The last importation of Portuguese, who cost about S300 a head, or 825 
a month to planters, was, it is said, a political move of his initiation, 
for the purpose of advertising white immigration. Even his friends 
accuse him of bringing the government into disgrace at Washington at 
the most critical moment of the existence of the so-called republic of 
Hawaii. 



THE HAWAIIAN GOVERNMENT 27 



THE HAWAIIAN GOVERNMENT 



"Were an observer to be asked to name an element which is character- 
istic of the Hawaiian government, of the individuals composing and 
sustaining it, and of this community at the present moment,* he might 
truthfully reply, timidity; were he inclined to be discourteous, he would 
substitute the word cowardice. 

In the course of the past three weeks emigrant steamers have landed 
at Honolulu about 2.400 aliens; these came from Japan, the Azores, 
and China ; in numbers, more than a third from the first-named country, 
or say, in round numbers, 1,000, 800, and 600. None of these were 
wanted. A like proportion of immigrants, ignorant of the laws, the 
language and customs of the nation, brought by interested parties to 
the State of New York, might justly alarm economists. Why then 
did these come? The treaties with Japan render her a favored na- 
tion ; it is for her interest to ship off her surplus population, and the 
commission house here makes its profit on every ship and its passengers ; 
the immigration commissioners simply cannot interfere, and although 
local journalists cry aloud that responsibility for this latest arrival should 
be traced and strong admonition given, nothing prohibitory results. 
The latest importation of Portuguese was a political move, under Mr. 
Thurston's advice, to curry favor with those here who oppose the 
Chinese, and also to pose before the world as a country encouraging 
white immigration. It has been with difficulty that the shipments from 
Japan and the Azores were placed on the plantations ; the Chinese with 
accustomed shrewdness take care of themselves and of each other ; the 
government has the least to fear from immigrants of this nation ; yet, 
strange to say, they alone give bonds for an ultimate return to the land 
whence they came. 

Those best informed do not confirm the favorable opinion held by the 
people of the United States as to the Japanese. The upper classes are 
crafty, deceptive, destitute of all constancy to the principles of integrity 
and business honor. The common laborers are sensitive to the least 
affront, real or fancied, quick-tempered, prompt to avenge an insult, 



28 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

almost implacable if excited, holding the lives of others very cheaply. 
They are united, and for this reason are ready to adopt the trades-union 
principle of strikes. This is a formidable weapon on an isolated plan- 
tation, and on a recent disagreement the proprietor of such a one owed 
the safety of his family and his own life to the fact that while 500 
Japanese were maintaining the attitude of menace, a hundred native 
Hawaiians were in reserve ready to initiate a petty war of the races at 
an instant's warning. It was a great mistake to substitute this people 
for the thrifty and amiable Chinaman. None better know this now than 
those who catered to senseless prejudice for the sake of a brief popularity. 
The natives of Hawaii and of China fused admirably, intermarried, and 
enriched the land ; Hawaiians and Japanese are antagonistic ; if anything 
would rally the former to the support of the present government, it would 
be the threatened subjection of these islands to the empire of Japan. 

While the introduction of the Portuguese was a measure in favor of 
the permanent settlement of white emigrants, yet the results foreshadow 
as much danger as support to the ruling ring. They are intensely jealous 
of the two Mongolian races, and will refuse to work if any Japanese or 
Chinese are conjointly employed. They demand superior treatment, 
together with suffrages and privileges such as are granted to others of 
European lineage. 

Although the government announces to the world that the attempt at 
resistance by the natives is overwhelmingly suppressed, yet it is an open 
secret here that very little of the munition of war smuggled into the 
country was found. A very recent incident shows how the rulers dread 
a gathering of the ruled. The body of Ex- Attorney-General Petersen 
arrived here for interment. As he was considered a martyr to the native 
cause, a large number of Hawaiians wished to do him honor by attend- 
ing his funeral. Not the least intimation of the ceremony, either prior 
thereto or thereafter, appeared in any newspaper. Further, his family 
were warned that the burial must take place with promptness, that it 
must be strictly private, and that no crowd or display would be permitted. 
When those interested inquired about the hour of the funeral, it was dis- 
covered that the soil of Hawaii already lay lightly on his coffin. 

The avenues of employment are almost entirely under the control of 
the government or individual members of it. The latest meeting of the 
councils was nothing less than a high court of inquisition ; there was no 
attempt to disguise this fact, nor to conceal the names of those who had 
done or said too little or too much. The question of convocation of the 
legislature is still undecided, so that the anomalous position is main- 
tained of the old provisionalist councils and an elected assembly coex- 



THE HAWAIIAN GOVERNMENT 29 

isting, and many believe that the former do not dare to dissolve, leaving 
deliberative legislation to those chosen six months ago for this very 
purpose. The policy of the executive in this respect must be declared 
within thirty days. * 

There is one phase of the Hawaiian question of which little notice 
has yet been taken ; this is surprising when there are so many American 
writers of the sex of the deposed Queen. Either in public or in private 
life the Hawaiian people might serve as examples of love and loyalty 
to the gentler sex ; the native of humble birth gladly gives a mortgage 
which he knows will never be paid, in order to gratify some caprice of 
his sweetheart. The central point of union to all parties in Hawaii has 
ever been devotion to the native monarchy, and even where the crown 
was worn by a king, there has been an undercurrent of chivahic love 
for the feminine consort. Obliteration of this basis of concord is the 
cause of to-day's anarchy, and the missionary party are chiefly blamable 
for its destruction. 

Emma and Liliuokalani were both educated, gracious, upright, Chris- 
tian women, such being the estimate of all their subjects during a half- 
century. From childhood to past their fiftieth year none of their recent 
detractors dissented. But after the death of her husband and ten years 
of retirement, Emma was a candidate for the throne. Her reputation 
was above attack, but it was said that strains of English blood ran in 
her veins ; she had visited London, she had been attracted by the 
worship of the Anglican church, had introduced it to Hawaii, and both 
she and her husband were communicants. For such cause, and no 
other, her enemies, by a series of disgraceful acts, defeated the will of 
her people, and by notable fraud placed a man on the throne by dis- 
placing a woman, who accepted the undisguised wrong with a resignation 
maintained to her dying day. Soon those who boasted that Kalakaua 
had been seated on the throne by them professed great indignation that 
the creature was not more obedient to the creator. Although they raised 
an arm to strike, yet the man's government was not overthrown. But 
silent conspiracy found expression in January, 1893, when they borrowed 
our troops under pretext of keeping order, made a contract of arbitration 
afterwards repudiated, and thus deprived his sister of her throne and his 
niece, Princess Kaiulani, of her inheritance. 

Walking along the public streets the other evening, my attention was 
involuntarily attracted to the conversation of two Hawaiians of humble 
birth, who were discussing, sometimes in their own language, again in 
ours, the political situation. Finally from their lips fell the emphatic 
words, twice repeated, " Oh, their day will come ! " 



30 AGAIN IX HAWAII 



EVENTS AFTER ME. THURSTON'S RETURN 



Honolulu, April 18. {By Schooner Aloha.) 

Minister Thurston's statement that his return was not hastened by 
diplomatic differences is not sustained by facts. When President Dole 
returned from his vacation to meet him, the two were closeted for a pro- 
tracted interview, but all information on the subject is still denied to the 
public. 

Mr. Damon, minister of finance and a leading banker here, met his 
partner, Mr. Bishop, and Mr. Thurston, in San Francisco, for a con- 
ference of the three. No man ever did more for Hawaii than Mr. 
Bishop, yet since the troubles he has resided in California, and now 
withdraws his name from the bank he founded forty years ago, confirm- 
ing the general opinion that, without the military and financial inter- 
position of a stronger power, government without the consent of the 
governed cannot endure. Mr. Damon and Mr. Thurston returned 
together by the latest steamer, and it is hinted that the former may sur- 
render the portfolio of finance, which would be a misfortune. 

Ashford, a royalist, has placed his oppressors in a dilemma by refusing 
the acceptance of their pardon. Policemen were detailed to guard his 
sick-bed. He was a confidant of the very men now in power when, 
eight j T ears ago, they overthrew the authority, although not the throne, 
of Kalakaua. When their purpose was accomplished against a woman's 
right to rule, both the Ashfords declined joining, and their former asso- 
ciates hoped to permanently exile them. 

Secretary Gresham's letter to Mr. Jones gives great satisfaction save 
to partisan sympathizers and the gentleman himself, because his timidity 
in assisting the treasury financially, and avoidance of personal peril, as 
well as his sworn allegiance to both the Queen and the President, are 
notorious facts. 

For two years the Queen's band of musicians have refused allegiance 
to the government, and this disloyalty continues. At their public con- 
cert recently, over two thousand persons were present. A prior enter- 



EVENTS AFTER MR. THURSTON'S RETURN 31 

tainment, given by the musicians organized by the government, was 
attended by about one hundred. Such is the universal contrast. 

A naval officer recently gave an exhibition in aid of the leper settle- 
ment. He exhibited three military scenes of the late attempted revolu- 
tion. Two were borne in silence; at the third, a subdued hissing 
began, and he hurried forward the programme. 

This is the officer who was by invitation of the government the orator 
of the day at the first anniversary of the alleged republic. At a second 
stereopticon exhibition, his most elaborate illustration was that of the 
landing of a naval battalion in which United States troops were de- 
picted marching and counter-marching in anion with the Hawaiian 
standing army and the citizen's guard, the grand finale representing 
President Dole protected by their joint efforts and seated in official 
dignity under the wings of a powerful and friendly eagle. If object- 
teaching supplants with effectiveness the parrot-learned lesson, Hawaii is 
in a fair way to learn that the power which sustains the present oligarclry 
is located on the vessels of the United States Navy. 

Misrepresentation of any kind is still considered a diplomatic neces- 
sity by the authorities here, and this policy dictates the general de- 
spatches and private letters of the provisionalists. 

The solution of the financial, political, and race problems which is 
now most coveted by the wealthy class is that Hawaii should continue 
independent, but that the United States shall openly declare a protecto- 
rate ; in other words, that a coming American President shall undo the 
work of Minister Blount. 



32 AGAIN IN HAWAII 



CHINESE IMMIGRATION AND GENERAL 

AMNESTY 



Honolulu, April 28. 

Chinese immigration is to be revived in Hawaii, and contracts made 
for about 5,000 laborers, so as to return Japanese on the expiration of 
their contracts, restricting further arrivals from Japan to those who 
come on their own responsibility. The increasing importance of the 
Japanese question causes the appointment of a minister to that empire 
to be publicly advocated ; a new treaty is much desired, but Japan being 
at the flush of success, Hawaii fears that too exacting conditions may 
be demanded. The position is now filled by a consular agent without 
pay, and as nothing is yet done for Thurston, it is possibly a move to 
provide for him. The existing treaty with Japan gives favored-nation 
privileges to her people ; there is no treaty with China, but to return to 
Chinese immigration means to offend Japan, because there are stipula- 
tions to the contrary, and, further, the introduction of Chinese is offen- 
sive to the laboring class of Europeans. 

The results of the foreign investigation into the legal jurisdiction of 
the recent court-martial are anxiously awaited by friends of the prison- 
ers, who believe that the other powers should have insisted on jury 
trials, and by the government sympathizers, who cannot disabuse them- 
selves of the notion that President Cleveland is treating with Great 
Britain for concerted and unfriendly action. Ex-Minister Thurston is 
supposed to advocate a general amnesty so as to disarm external criti- 
cism and insure against foreign intervention. Payment of the fine with 
a promise to leave the country would release any offenders. The influ- 
ence of the natives deported to other islands is seditious by reason of 
their good behavior and the sympathy they have excited. 

Reliable information has reached Honolulu of royalist meetings on 
Maui, better organized and more generally attended than ever, and a 
large shipment of arms has just gone to Lahaina to the citizens' guard. 
On four successive nights armed Honolulu police were detailed to watch 



CHINESE IMMIGRATION AND GENERAL AMNESTY 33 



for landing of allies from abroad. It is now said that the government 
was justified in its fears, but incorrect as to the destination of the expe- 
dition ; that the next demonstration will be a native revolt on other 
islands, and that forces being thus withdrawn from Honolulu, the place 
will be unprotected against a new uprising. 

To show exactly how the government proposes to meet this emer- 
gency, the following extract is made from a press despatch to a news- 
paper in America which favors the Hawaiian oligarchy : 

" The government has a force of 1,200 soldiers, fully armed and 
equipped, who could easily quell any uprising. Foreign filibusters 
would meet with little if any sympathy from the people on landing in 
the islands if they were able to get ashore. Landing would be a diffi- 
cult performance, in view of the scarcity of roadsteads and good harbors 
in the waters surrounding the islands. Moreover, the United States 
man-of-war Philadelphia, which is lying at Honolulu, would, in case of 
trouble, send several hundred bluejackets ashore, and this force would 
be practically a supplement to the local regulars and constabulary. 
Colonel McLean, who has been recently selected to organize the Ha- 
waiian army, will sail for Honolulu on May 2." 

A petition for a general amnesty was started and signed by natives 
and presented to President Dole on his birthday. That event was to 
have been celebrated by a public reception and general exchange of 
courtesies, bat after official announcement had been made in the morn- 
ing paper, all the orders were countermanded and a notice of the change 
posted. No explanation was given, but not a consular flag was displayed, 
no guns were fired, nor an official call made. Public rumor assigned the 
reason to be " strained diplomatic relations." 

The speech of Mr. Shearman, translated into the native language and 
put into circulation here, has excited warm interest anions; Hawaiians. 



34 AGAIN IN HAWAII 



A MISCARRIED LETTER 



Honolulu, May 2. 

The evening prior to the departure of this mail, the government gave 
publicity to a strange story explanatory of the Thurston affair. The 
kt Gaelic," from China, and the u Coptic," bound to Hong Kong, arrived 
here on April 30. The latter steamer brought a separate sealed bag for 
Minister Willis from the Washington Department of State. In this was 
a duplicate of the letter demanding the recall of Mr. Thurston. Then 
it was announced that the original went to Hong Kong by an error of 
the Postal Department at San Francisco, and that it was found on the 
"Gaelic." It was certainly delivered to Minister Willis, and its con- 
tents were by him officially communicated to the government here, upon 
which a session of the councils was called and held behind closed doors. 
No conclusion was reached, but the party organ says this morning that 
Minister Willis will remain, so far as this government is concerned ; that 
no successor to Mr. Thurston will be appointed for the present, diplo- 
matic affairs remaining in charge of Mr. Hastings, and that for Hawaii 
it is not a question now of what is justice in this affair, but rather what 
is the best policy. 

The petition for general amnesty, carried to President Dole on his 
birthday by a native woman, was her individual work, and might have 
been dismissed as unimportant, but the discussion once started became 
warm in the councils, two members protesting against any lenit}^, while 
three, including Mr. Dole, favored clemency. Minister Thurston's ad- 
vice, that, in order to stand well with the outside world, amnesty to those 
whose only offence was sympathy with the lost cause is desirable, added 
to the ferment, and words passed which were little short of a threatened 
disruption of the cabinet. There is scarcely a person imprisoned who was 
found with arms, and sympathy has never been a punishable offence. 

Secretary Gresham's letter deciding the Bowler case utterly displeased 
the planters and merchants who have tried to maintain the opposite 
doctrine of dual citizenship, and is considered an indirect reply to one of 
these, the Mr. Jones who offered to pa}^ an income tax. By this decision 
he and his associates can no longer claim that our navy must protect the 



A MISCARRIED LETTER 35 

persons and property acquired in Hawaii, under favors received from its 
monarchs, often by reason of official connection with reigning powers. 
They would gladly release Bowler to reverse the decision. 

On May 11 will take place a formidable local celebration of the 
victory of Japan over China. Over twenty thousand men have notified 
the planters that no work will be done on that day. Merchants of that 
nationality have contributed liberally in money, floats are being con- 
structed representing the Japanese navy, and wooden guns and tin 
swords for the equipment of the miniature army. The government is 
constrained to permit salutes from the Japanese artillery, although exces- 
sively dreading a conflict with the Chinese population. The authori- 
ties cannot suppress the projected jubilee, therefore they will rely on 
two considerations : First, the placid disposition of all Chinamen abroad ; 
second, the battalions of the ; ' Philadelphia," which are constantly 
paraded here in full fighting trim. For fifty years our navy has been 
the Hawaiian standing army. It placed Kalakaua on the throne and 
unseated Liliuokalani, and it now keeps the oligarchy in power. 
Should our naval officers fraternize with political parties abroad, 
as they accept the most intimate special attention from members 
of the Hawaiian government here, should they reflect in official reports 
the sentiments and perhaps the exact language of wealthy residents 
scheming for a protectorate, the officers would be ordered home. 

Pearl Harbor is totally indefensible, even if the long movable sand- 
bar were dredged. No salient point exists on which a fort could defend 
the entrance, nor is there anything to prevent the immediate obstruction 
of the channel by an enemy, and, with a fleet there shut up, the march of 
an army in the rear, on Honolulu. Its only apology is a real-estate 
speculation and increased naval power, or to secure an official protecto- 
rate without the disadvantages of annexation. 

The press gives the ruling ring much trouble. On the abandoned 
plant of the royalist newspaper, a syndicate of sugar-barons are trying 
to organize a journal opposing annexation and advocating a protecto- 
rate. Another opposition journal is trimming betwixt disloyalty and 
safety, and still a third is republished in the native language on condi- 
tion of excluding politics. Its editor is under a long-pending indict- 
ment, but he saves himself by copying matter already published in the 
city. In the Thurston and general amnesty affairs, there was serious 
trouble with the government press, but it was hushed up. 

The British minister has received notice that two of the political pris- 
oners must be considered subjects of this government. He declines to 
say what will be the next move of Great Britain. 



36 AGAIN IN HAWAII 



RULE OF THE COUNCIL AND ITS EFFECT 



Honolulu, May 8. 

The most exciting topic here is the communication of British Com- 
missioner Hawes holding that Rickard and Walker, the "insurgents," 
have not forfeited their citizenship. A long and secret session of the 
council was held afterward. The government make public the letter of 
Commissioner Hawes, but beyond stating that the claim will be contested, 
no further information is offered. Coming almost simultaneously with 
the action of the American Department of State, the British decision has 
proved equally annoying to the nineteen rulers here. If Secretary Gresham 
had sustained the principle of dual citizenship, although this might have 
given protection to prisoners, yet it would also have established a status 
for the American-born element which they have tried hard to maintain. 
Had the two decisions been interchanged, the Dole government would 
have met the diplomatic difficulty with far more cheerfulness. 

President Dole has written a personal letter to the initiator of the 
native action for amnesty, declaring that it is the wish and intention of 
the government to show clemency, but that its exercise must be condi- 
tional on the interests of the community, on the conduct of the prison- 
ers, and on the course of their friends. There are bitter complaints 
current here of the treatment of the natives who were exiled to a distant 
island. The native population is daily becoming morose and sullen. 
Annexation clubs and provisionalist oaths among the Hawaiians have 
been the most absolute failures. The great mass of the people are 
more strongly than ever attached to the native monarchy, and still look 
to the United States to right their nation's wrongs. 

Minister Thurston has been a troublesome element ever since his 
return. A strange idea got current among the natives, namety, that, 
having been convinced that annexation had failed, he had now returned 
to make a compromise on the abdication of the late Queen in favor of 
Kaiulani, the English princess. It is certain that those in sympathy 
with the present movement have openly declared that, if there can be no 



UULE OF THE COUNCIL AND ITS EFFKCT o < 

annexation or protectorate obtained, peace will be impossible save under 
some such agreement as that, siuce it is the only basis of peace and 
harmony. A prominent s} 7 inpathizer declared in my hearing: " It is an 
impossibility, because the Saxon race never yet did yield to an inferior 
race, the rule once gained." This was the chief objection. 

Numberless places are proposed to relieve the country of the presence 
of Mr. Thurston. The latest is that of commissioner of information, 
with an office at Washington. As a professed lobbyist, without diplo- 
matic relations, it is urged that he can still manage the legation, the 
new minister having thus the benefit of his experience, while the com- 
missioner will have more freedom in approaching members of Congress. 

The rumor that the silver balance in the treasury is not exactly intact 
gains force by the fact that on May 1 the government openly advised 
that no further purchases would be made excepting on a credit of three 
or six months. Those holding claims are forced to raise the rnone} 7 
alread} T due by deposit of accounts duly approved at the bank, secur- 
ing thus accommodations on collateral by paying interest at twelve per 
cent, per annum. From President Dole downward, even the supporters 
of the ruling ring are investing their surplus receipts outside the country. 
Attorneys for the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York are 
not satisfied that any judgment whatsoever of the local courts will be 
final, because their organization is contested as unconstitutional. 

Mr. Carter, brother of the man of that name killed in the January 
riot, having declined to run, Mr. Robertson, late district attorney's 
assistant, was elected representative, receiving all the votes cast, only 
111 in a district which has polled in the past nearly 2,000 votes. There 
was no interest whatsoever in the election, it being perfectly understood 
that the ring had placed in power one of its own creatures, a young man 
of twenty-six who resigned another office to take this one. 

It is still doubtful whether the legislature is to be immediately con- 
vened, because the advisory council, consisting of fourteen members, 
being once dissolved, cannot be revived, and although some of these 
have seats in the legislature, yet it will double the numbers of the 
lower house to be manipulated by the remaining and upper five of the 
ring. 

The government has succeeded in exiling both the Ashfords. The 
remaining brother, in a dying condition, leaves to-day, having, at the 
prayer of his family, acceded to any conditions ; but the oath never to 
return is considered of little importance, because, if the country is to 
continue under its present despotism, no lover of freedom would wish to 



38 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

return ; while if an} 7 change for the better intervenes, the course of the 
nineteen will be repudiated and return will become a matter of personal 
choice. 

Disinterested tourists arriving here are taken under the charge of pro- 
visionalist partisans, and every attention and courtes} 7 is shown them. 
All the old absurd fictions about the Queen are repeated, and they are 
carefully guarded from opportunities to correct such impressions. Yet, 
almost with no exception, a residence of a month convinces them of the 
fraud of the so-called republic and excites sympathy for the disinherited 
and disfranchised Hawaiians, 

For two years the Queen's band of forty members has refused to 
swear allegiance to the ring. The government has oppressed them in 
every way, even refusing them permission for public concerts. It now 
carries its animosity to the point of prohibiting them from playing a 
farewell to Hawaii on the dock. Spreckels has given them free passage 
to San Francisco, whence they may go to other parts of America, but they 
were obliged to get on board the steamer before giving their farewell 
music. The excitement attending their departure was intense ; some 
three thousand natives were on the wharf, and the men were loaded 
with flowers. They are superior musicians, and sympath} 7 for them is 
universal. 



PEARL HARBOR 39 



PEARL HARBOR 



There is actually an international agreement of three great powers 
guaranteeing Hawaiian independence. It is this: By treaty of 1843, 
made in London, Great Britain and France bound each the other that 
neither would directly or under the form of protectorate possess the soil ; 
then by the Americo-Hawaiian treaty of 1875, and its extensions, 
Hawaii is bound to refuse to a foreign power any lien upon its territory. 
It was this provision which obliged the present government to decline 
the proposal of England to make of Neckar Island a telegraph station. 
It may be said that this treaty can be abrogated. Granted ; but it 
would be commercial suicide to Hawaii to submit its products to our 
tariff, and as twelve months' notice is specified, no advantage can be 
taken of the emergency of international questions. 

The cession of Pearl Harbor to the United States was not in the 
original treaty ; it was interpolated by Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, 
in the renewal of 1884, confirmed by the Senate in 1886, and then by 
diplomatic concord made part of the earlier stipulations. The provision 
was regarded with great disfavor by Hawaiians, because they are always 
jealous of the least infringement on their native right to the land. Mr. 
Cleveland was displeased both on account of his conservative foreign 
policy and because the business of the Senate was either to approve or 
disapprove, but not to amend, any treaty, and thus his prerogative was 
usurped. The only parties satisfied were those who to-day control the 
government in Honolulu, the sugar-barons and their friends. 

No sea-going vessel, not even a coaster, is to be seen in Pearl Harbor. 
The first obstacle is the coral reef, which extends in a westerly direction 
from Diamond Head, past the port of Honolulu and the entrance to the 
long channel leading into the salt-water lakes of the harbor. Borings 



40 AGAIX IN HAWAII 

of this reef by officers of our navy disclose the fact that Band-dredging 

rather than blasting will be necessary in order to make a ship-channel. 
This apparent advantage is counterpoised by the fact that rock once 
removed is not renewed, but sand can be washed into the entrance by 
the ocean just as easily as it can be pumped out by the dredge. In case 
of war a fleet could be shut up in the lakes by a manoeuvre taking only 
the hours of one dark night, and at no more expense than the sinking of 
a few stone-laden steamers against which the sands would soon make an 
impassable barrier. 

The channel, some three miles in length and nowhere much more 
than a quarter-mile in width, runs north and south, and can never be 
safely used by any vessel of size unaided by steam power. When the 
north-east trade wind is interrupted by southerly gales, the approaches 
to the harbor, by reason of the succession of reefs, would, for a full- 
powered steamer, be attended with great danger. Therefore, no ship in 
distress could be certain of meeting a friendly tug-boat. 

About three-fourths of the distance from ocean to lake is the tongue 
of a peninsula, which divides the waters into at least two ports, in both 
of which there is a due proportion of deep and also of shallow water. 
It is quite doubtful whether either of these enclosed sheets of water 
would afford room for naval tactics, and certain that there are places 
where our long white boats could not even turn round, although lying in 
deep water and moored to the shore. Shoals, coral rocks, and spits are 
present here as in all other enclosures, a i,d. while berths for vessels 
would be almost infinite in number, that the navies of the world could 
exchange compliments within its gates is far from true. The deepest 
water is in the long, narrow channels. 

The spot to defend, providing the harbor were utilized, would be that 
which is dredged or blasted out on the outer reef. But how is this to be 
done? By building on the inner reefs of coral? A modern battle-ship 
with its heavy guns could knock stone forts over as if they were nine- 
pins. By earthworks on the land? For miles from the entrance there 
is no suitable elevation, even were one contented with. say. a height of 
ten feet, and the difference in tides is not more than two feet. Were 
the Washington government to declare its intention to utilize this cession, 
doubtless the end of the promontory and the spot known as Ford's 
Islaud would be sold to us at enormous prices ; our national needs would 
be supplied by the real-estate speculators who have the control of the 
whole shore ; in fact, deeds have passed where provision is made for an 



PEARL HARBOR 41 

increased consideration in case sale should be made to any foreign 
government. 

Pearl City, so called, exists chiefly on paper. There are a few 
houses at one spot on the lagoons, an occasional lodge or sen side resi- 
dence, the latter little more than a wooden tent ; nothing even to 
approach in importance the suburb of Waikiki under the shadow of 
Diamond Head, distant some ten miles to the eastward. It is between 
these two points that is built the city of Honolulu, but by reason of its 
tortuous course it is fifteen miles by railway from this city to the Pearl 
Lochs. 

This brief description of our proposed naval station is given as a 
proof that while Mr. Edmunds made a parliamentary stroke in securing 
the extension of the reciprocity treaty by this bait, Mr. Cleveland was 
perfectly justified in his disapproval ten years ago of that policy of 
" Jingoism," which of late finds such defenders as Mr. Lodge. Have 
we forgotten the rebuke consequent on our adoption of such a policy in 
Samoa, where our appearance in a protectorate made local troubles 
worse, our so-called coaling-station cost us three naval vessels and a 
large sacrifice of human life, and it would be impossible to say what 
has become of our gains? 

But were Pearl Harbor far better adapted for naval purposes than it 
is at present, it is still true that the American people have no use for it. 
Even in the days when we had a large fleet of whale-ships and merchant- 
vessels in the Pacific Ocean, Honolulu and Lahaina were found to be 
convenient ports of call and proper stations for supplies ; that which was 
true then is far more so to-day, because the ports of Hawaii are now in 
communication by steam with larger centres of distribution. But our 
whaling-fleet has gone, never to return. In the two months of my stay 
here, one whaling-vessel has touched at Honolulu. During the same 
time last year two came-to for provisions oft the port. Of merchantmen, 
excepting the sugar-carriers, the statistics are of no more importance. In 
many cruises upon the sea between the coast of California and these 
islands, not a single sail will be encountered. And yet one of the argu- 
ments in favor of annexation or the improvement of Pearl Harbor is 
that, with the addition of a submarine cable, our ships would find it a 
convenient port of call for orders. Whose ships, and where are they? 
Orders to what end? Are the American people ignorant of the uncon- 
tested facts that we have no mercantile fleet cruising in the Pacific or any 
other ocean, and if we had, there would be no necessity of sending 



42 AGAIN IN HAWAII 

them out over two thousand miles from our coast for orders of any 
nature ? 

But the coaling-station argument? The two liues of steamships 
under our flag passing Hawaii have uever experienced the least difficulty 
in supplying their bunkers with coal at Honolulu, and the same is true of 
our naval steamers ; the latter probably purchase coal at a far lower 
price than that which the government would pay if it entered the busi- 
ness as a competitor iu this line. There is no necessity of ever sending 
any American man-of-war here, other than that of an occasional emer- 
gency just as liable to present itself in an} 7 other quarter of the globe. 
There is no greater fraud attempted on the people of the United States 
than that of assuming that there is American capital in these islands 
having a right to American protection. With the single exception of 
the money made in California and invested here by the firm of Spreckels 
& Co., scarcely one dollar of capital was ever brought here by those 
imperious sugar-barons who now so impudently call on us to protect 
them in troubles resulting from their own greed of gain and love of 
power. Twenty years ago these now haughty planters and proud mer- 
cantile houses were bankrupt. That monarchy which they malign came 
to their rescue, negotiated a treaty under which they raised sugar, im- 
ported coolie labor by which its proper cultivation was insured, even ad- 
vancing capital, indirectly yet promptly, that they might through bankers' 
loans handle their crops, and leasing them valuable lands for a trifling- 
rent. As a result of this favoritism shown to them by Hawaii, they 
became rich off Hawaiian soil and by royal favor. Xow, stinging the 
hand that raised them out of ruin, they call the enormous wealth they 
have accumulated American capital. 

Just here those who have involved us in an enormous outlay for the 
building of a vast fleet of steel and iron-clad steamboats will ask if 
Pearl Harbor would not be invaluable to us in case of war ; they empha- 
size this question by reference to the colonization policy of Great Britain. 
Where one is forced to cross a stream, each stepping-stone is important ; 
where one has nothing on the opposite bank, wiry should a half-way rock 
be needful? Great Britain is an empire of colonies. On her way from 
Victoria to New Zealand or Hong Kong, it might be convenient for her 
to have a basis of repairs and supplies at Honolulu. But in case of war, 
why should we withdraw our fleet from the protection of our western 
coast, and send our vessels two thousand miles to play hide and seek 
with each other in the numberless channels which divide these islands ? 



PEARL HARBOR 43 

Concentration and not division is good generalship, yet men whose edu- 
cation should teach them better tactics advocate a policy in this prob- 
lematic war only paralleled by that of supposing an army to be 
voluntarily separated by its leader into two sections with an impassable 
river rolling between the two detachments. Naval officers of high rank 
have advocated, in carefully prepared articles, the voluntary abandonment 
by Great Britain of the Mediterranean in case of war with continental 
powers. Were the Hawaiian islands to become American territory, the 
prudent course for us would be to immediately leave them to any fate 
rather than sap our own strength by herculean efforts to defend them. 
One swift gun-boat dodging in and out of these channels could defy the 
whole body of our naval police, burning plantations, while our efforts to 
hinder such destruction would only cripple our western coast defences 
and leave them an easy prey to a hostile fleet. Seamen cannot be made 
iu a day, even where the use of steam has rendered much technical edu- 
cation a thing of the past. If a fleet large enough to defend Hawaii were 
built at once, where would be found the officers and men to man the 
vessels and work the guns? 

Land speculation and desire for promotion — these two terms express 
all that there is in this hue and cry about Pearl Harbor. The specula- 
tors cannot be blamed, because the old caution of caveat emptor fully 
exonerates them. But the course of the naval officers of the United 
States is exactly that of trustees seeking their own gain rather than the 
good of those for whom they should be guardians. Haw r aii is the naval 
officers' paradise. It has many of the charms of the Mediterranean 
station without the enormous expenses of the latter. With the airy 
modern-built steamboat moored on these beautiful waters, to which will 
come for the evening ball the beauty and wealth of Honolulu, with the 
most distinguished attentions not only to himself, but to his wife and 
daughters, at the palaces of the island princes ashore, it would be very 
strange if the naval officer did not become an enthusiastic annexationist, 
and a believer in the immediate improvement of Pearl Harbor. To 
report otherwise would be to discourage the very means by which he 
earns his income. To advise naval extension is, on the contrary, to 
make the delightful colony here larger, to give to other aspirants the 
opportunity to live royally on a limited scale of wages, and to help them 
up the ladder of promotion. Once yielding to the speculators and to 
their allies, the naval officers, the American people will find their treas- 
ury pledged to outlays for dredges, blasting-apparatus, fortifications, 



44 



AGAIN IX HAWAII 



lights, gunboats, arsenals on shore ; in short, they will too late discover 
that they have been betrayed into the clutches of a veritable old man of 
the sea, who has dragged not only the present generation into its depths. 
but entailed on posterity the wofnl consequences of departing from a 
policy which' has kept us a peaceful, conservative nation amidst the 
foreign broils of the past century. 




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